My wife's parents in a nutshell, right there, born in '49 and '50.
Both very well off, and their entire lives have been about "me."
So, on Boomers, and what little political discourse we're allowing here.....
My Boomer parents are doing "okay," but not "well off" by most definitions. Dad could be in better shape, partly due to some things in life he could've done differently but made choices that he has to live with, and partly because a couple of things were done to him through no fault of his own, that he nevertheless bears the consequences for. As it is, he worked hard, always provided for me and my sister, though he has a very modest retirement to show for it. Mom worked hard, the last 20 years or so of her career for the state. Has a stable retirement because of that, though not a lucrative one. Her husband is almost certain to die before her, if I had to guess from his present health, and that will change her situation. His daughters will get the house and the bulk of his assets.
My FIL is a Boomer and has been very successful. Semi-retired, but not really, because as far as I can tell, he likes working too much to retire. He built up some kind of shipping logistics business, turned a lot of the business over to one of his partners and other aspects to a hand-picked protege, but he continues to work from home for them 3 or 4 days a week.
Mom/dad and my FIL are on very different ends of a political and ideological spectrum. They would not agree on many things related to government or its role. Not sure they would agree on the abstract discussion we're having about Boomers.
But all three of them worked extremely hard, did all they could to provide for their kids, and are generous, possibly to a fault. I've lived my entire life watching my parents help other people within their reach, even when it came at personal cost. When I say my folks are not wealthy, believe me. But that never stopped them from helping people if it was mathematically possible. And often times their help came not in financial help, but in offering other services. Mom will drop everything to be there for people in a variety of ways. Dad is an excellent carpenter and has donated tons of man-hours and cost of supplies, helping people with home repairs who couldn't otherwise afford it. Though I also have lost track of the ways they've given money, when people truly needed it. It would probably be small beans to many, but for the people it helped, it was everything, and it wasn't exactly chump change to them either.
And I've known my FIL now plenty long enough to have witnessed his generosity. He built a business over years and created jobs for many people for decades. So he has a lot of money (I perceive).....big deal. He took risks, he provided a service people either wanted or needed, he created income and even wealth for other people. And he helps a lot of people, from what I gather. Every several years he gives a chunk of cash to each of his three kids because he feels like it. Unlike my parents, he's made a lot of money (or at least managed to keep more of it), and undoubtedly has a very different voting record than either of them. Yet, like them, he is a giver, and from what I can tell from afar, similarly strives to help those he can reach.
I don't see any of them as "me" people. They're not selfish, and they certainly aren't unconcerned about Gen X, Z, or Alpha. They have different ideas on the best way to make things better, and have quite different track records of voting on account of it. But fundamentally, they want the same things. I know they're far from the only ones. So I think it's simplistic and dull to think Boomers don't care, don't help anything, and are just "me" people. I know you didn't say that, but it seems to be a popular thought out there. And not one I find particularly credible.
In the ways Boomers "failed," the full story, as usual, is nuanced, complex, and replete with cause, effect, unforeseen consequences, some bad ideas here and there, people being mislead, bad apples in the bunch, inability to perfectly predict the future.....i.e., all the things we see with every generation. I think the circumstances and technology of the world they grew up in and inherited were different than anything previous, far more than I think the Boomers themselves were greatly different than previous generations.
IMHO.
