Generation X

Generation X, often shortened to Gen X, is the demographic cohort following the baby boomers and preceding millennials. Researchers and popular media often use the mid-1960s as its starting birth years and the late 1970s to early 1980s as its ending birth years, with the generation generally defined as people born from 1965 to 1980. By this definition and U.S. census data, there are 65.2 million Gen Xers in the United States as of 2019. Most Gen Xers are the children of the Silent Generation and older baby boomers, and many are the parents of millennials, Generation Z and older Generation Alpha. As children in the 1970s and 1980s, a time of shifting societal values, Gen Xers were sometimes called the "Latchkey Generation", a reference to their returning as children from school to an empty home and using a key to let themselves in. This was a result of what is now called free-range parenting, increasing divorce rates, and increased maternal participation in the workforce before widespread availability of childcare options outside the home. Video games, via both arcades and home consoles, were also a major part of childhood entertainment for the first time among Xers. As adolescents and young adults in the 1980s and 1990s, Xers were dubbed the "MTV Generation" (a reference to the music video channel) and sometimes characterized as slackers, cynical, and disaffected. Some of the many cultural influences on Gen X youth included a proliferation of musical genres with strong social-tribal identity, such as dance-pop, new wave, punk rock, hip-hop, heavy metal, alternative rock, rave, and grunge. Film was also a notable cultural influence, via both the birth of franchise mega-sequels and a proliferation of independent film (enabled in part by video). Politically, Generation X experienced the last days of communism in the Soviet Union...