53 y/o baby boomer here and I’m not contemplating suicide but I know may guys my age that are not happy with there future prospects and I could see them throwing in the towel under the right set of circumstances. These are guys who always had jobs but not a career yet they managed to raise kids, buy homes and go on vacations because they worked hard. Now they may be divorced, estranged from their family and not healthy enough to do manual labor or even have the stamina or health it takes to be a truck driver (which is a good job for an older hard working type of guy). Add onto that health issues, possible legal issue with ex-spouses and lack of self purpose and you get people who may tend to drink too much; it can get depressing just to watch these guys go thru the motions and vent out rage when they drink.
We could be near doppelgangers, based on this.
My dad fought in WW II, on Guadalcanal. My sister is 9 years older than me, my brother is 13.
I don’t consider myself a boomer, but my siblings do, and, as was stated upthread, '64 seems to be the most commonly accepted cutoff point for Baby Boomers. I was born in May of 64.
Back on point, I heard the same NPR story, and I think I agree with others in that it’s the lack of opportunity for folks in their 50s. I got RIF’ed about 8 years ago, and had another job within a month. Actually had offers within a week, but I waited for the right one. If that happened today, I would probably just wind up doing consulting gigs. Based on my slkillset I can do that, and do pretty well, but not every boomer has that opportunity, so they are looking at finding another corporate gig that is willing hire a 50-something, at the salary that a 50-something has come to expect.
Is it just me, or is 50-54 kind of an odd random data point?
Too old to rock and roll, too young to die.
Not often I can sneak a little Jethro Tull into the Dope.
Not to me.
For American males traditionally early 50s is peak in the career arc and career is often a major source of worth for males in our culture. Boomer males seem to be a whiney wussy bunch woo-wooing that they did not move up the socioeconomic strata like their parents had, and maybe even went down some, despite having been given every advantage and constantly reassured how special they were. They may be past peak and see little chance of climbing more. They are looking back and not so happy with what they see in the rear veiw mirror. They have not taken great care of themselves and now are simpering that their bodies are showing and feeling it. Brains too, for some, especially those who have not taken care of themselves, the cognitive decline has begun. Looking ahead, they are realizing that the next life stage for them is not laurels but retirement, possibly with physical and/or cognitive disability, and, crap, they don’t have money saved or even anything to do with themselves other than work. Social networks? Not. Passions? Not. If some are prone biologically to depression all that, the lack of things they are proud of and the decline that has begun and is to come, will set them off. And some are just quitters by nature even without depression … why “endure discomfort?” as kayacker expresses for the cohort.
I don’t see it as odd at all.
They can say that all they want, but I have nothing in common with what “Baby Boomers” are all about.
Born in 1961, I missed the 50’s, have no “Happy Days/American Graffiti” nostalgia, I was too young for the hippie movement, free love, the Viet nam war, plus I don’t have an overwhelming sense of entitlement 
- in short, I have none of the things that “define” BBers.
I’m a tweener, lost in the unmarketable demographic gap.
You make some interesting points - which certainly can have a lot of validity, but it seems to be a bit of a fishing expedition.
I’d already heard that suicide was high for older men, but that was for septi-&octogenarian guys whose wives had died after long, long marriages. That kind of loss hits the pain centers of the brain the same as a limb amputation. Plus, unlike pre-retirement guys in their 50’s, they don’t have anything to fill their days.
YYMV, but if I didn’t kill myself to escape the Hell that called itself Junior High, what’s the point now? And, not to put too fine a point on it, you can find women who are attracted to bald guys. That didn’t hold true with acne.
We’re Generation Jones
Well, I’ve got the cynicism, at least.
“Generation Jones”. The image I get is a scruffy-haired guy with a beard, wearing bib overalls.
Sounds like my graduating class! I think the term is starting to grow on me.
Along came Jones…
Older women tend to have deeper relationships with their children, parents and other relatives that older men do not. I don’t have a cite for this handy, but if anyone doubts this, let me know. So this means women are more likely to have a support system.
It is already easier for women to seek out help when needed, because men are told all their lives that they need to tough it out and be strong. So this, plus the absence of close loved ones, makes them vulnerable to untreated depression.
When Sandra Bullock says “no”, there’s just no recovery from the devastation.
I’ve usually seen Generation Jones defined as a younger subset of Baby Boomers born between 1955 and 1964 inclusive. It’s a minor nitpick, though I do agree that the life experience of Jonesers has been significantly different from that of older Boomers.
Generally women have higher rates of suicide attempts but men have higher rates of suicide completion. So women are more likely to try and fail, men are less likely to try but more likely to succeed when they do. So women are making more attempts than men, I don’t know if that holds true for generation Jones or not but that is the general rule of thumb.
One theory I’ve heard about why people 50-59 are committing suicide more is that the same generation had a higher suicide rate as youngsters. So maybe something about this generation just primed them for suicide, and now that they are at an age where their motivation for self destruction is higher they are more likely to do it.
Because men have it easy. /s
When it isn’t easy men are suppose to man up, and suck it up. When that doesn’t work, we blow our brains out.
I’ve sat here for a while trying to think of how to word my reply to this but failed. I do think that in modern western society (I can’t speak for any other) men aren’t ‘allowed’ to admit they need help due to prevelant bullshit notions of masculinity and the idea that because ‘women have it worse’ they shouldn’t complain about anything at all.
And then we wonder why men are so violent, those repressed emotions have to go somewhere, either directed towards others or directed towards themselves.
Clearly you have no clue what a child of a depression-era parent went through. It can be summed up in one sentence: “Eat the food on your plate or go to your room without dinner”.
Arguments about it were not entertained.
No doubt he has boomer males mixed up with their kids. Our parents lived thru the depression and beat Hitler. They did not dot over the kids, quite the opposite. It was OK to physically punish your kids in public schools when I grew up and then go home and get another ass whipping. The boomers kids are the ones who benifted because we swore we wouldn’t be like them.
Since my parents were depression-era parents (Mom grew up in an early Chicago project, Dad in tenements and joined to fight in WWII only because his mother wouldn’t sign the papers to let him professionally box under 18, and when he got back and made decent money in sales would not take his money because she was sure he could only make cash like that beating people up for the mob) I think I have a very good idea of what a child of depression era parents went through, at least for an n of 5 kids (me and my four older sibs). And for quite a few others.
My depression-era parents had nothing, hardly any education, and moved into middle class and upper middle class. Most of my generation (and I admit I am the tail end at 55 but clearly more Boomer than not and sibs all clearly Boomers) got every possible advantage, especially the chance to be educated as far as our brains and motivation would take us. What have we accomplished with those advantages compared to what they did with so little? Did we beat Hitler? Did we pull ourselves out of poverty and provide our kids with a better life than we had? If you do not think that is the circumstance for many, then we will simply have to disagree … not for the first or last time.
In short my parents generation was tough; they had to be. We Boomers are in comparison wimps and many don’t understand about victory going to the one who gets back up one more time than he is knocked down.