The first wave of the Baby Boomer generation will celebrate their 80th birthdays in 2026, marking a historic demographic shift that sees the cohort dubbed the wealthiest in American history despite a 'hidden' inequality crisis.
Baby Boomers are people born between 1946 and 1964, as the name suggests, reflecting the increase in fertility that followed World War II. The US witnessed 76 million births during the boom, with the annual total exceeding four million in 1954 and remaining at that level until 1965. The annual number of births would not exceed four million again until 1989.
