Gap

I was born in 1980, which puts me right on the border between GenX and the Millennials. Pundits use a lot of different dates for deciding who is where, but I can tell you with absolute conviction that the line is the graduating class of 1998. Everyone I know who is older than that - even by a year - is unquestionably GenX, with GenX approaches to work, politics, relationships, and parenting. Everyone younger is firmly Millennial. The split is particularly clear when it comes to sexual politics, and is the main reason I decided to ally with the Millennials. If I walk into a game store, a male Millennial is going to take me seriously as a competitor. A GenXer will not.

As a result of this allegiance, which gradually worked its way into various ideologies and approaches, I tend to view people younger than me as about my age, with similar drives. For instance, I have an easy time talking with high school students, particularly smart ones. But it is equally true that people two to five years younger than me seem much older than that, and I tend to mis-guess their ages by about five years. The converse is also true; people a year older than I am regularly round me down by anywhere from three years to a decade. The same mistake is not made by non-Americans, or by people at least ten years older than I am.