Reviews - A Generation of Sociopaths: How the Baby Boomers Betrayed America

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199 reviews for:

A Generation of Sociopaths: How the Baby Boomers Betrayed America

Was turning into a read similar to an unpleasant homework assignment. Book and me-specific issues: multiple chapters dedicated to really dry tax and policy information chapters, tone is a bit... aggressive which I should have expected more based on the title. Reminds me of the James Acaster quote: "Never before have I been so offended by something I one hundred percent agree with."

saturn_xoxo's review against another edition

4.0

A very enlightening read, though a bit centrist in my opinion

lit_lady_jem's review

4.0

3.5 Stars

Book is a great insight into some of the history of a lot of the problems we're facing today in the US. Arguments are well researched and explained and as any good non-fiction book trying to educate does a great job at not being so dry you just give up on the book completely because you're too bored with the content.

That being said this was published before the end of Trump's term, Covid, the great resignation, a lot of damning climate change reports, etc so the suggestions at the end on how readers might help course correct the country to me seemed non valid anymore. Also some of the thoughts he has for for tax reform should be taken with a heavy grain of salt, he came from a privileged upbringing and is apart of the wealthy investor class and is either lying to himself or his audience about how much taxes the upper class is paying.

Spoiler

I do agree a lot of American's will have to "pay more" to fix our debt problem, getting more from the lower middle class isn't going to solve our problem or even scratch the surface. That's on the rich and companies actually paying a share of the debt they helped create.

varielble's review against another edition

2.0

This guy wants to blame all our problems on boomers but then adds a bunch of stipulations like "well not poor boomers, not boomers if color, not immigrants, etc. Baby, you're talking about capitalism. Also he literally admits to investing in the gig economy which has harmed younger generations looking for stable work. This author needs to take a look in the mirror before writing another book.

sydneyugalde's review against another edition

3.0

challenging funny informative reflective slow-paced

I enjoyed the first half of the book so much, probably because it was more culturally based (this is how boomers were raised, they are the first to grow up with TV, working moms, both parents had a car, most boomers actually met their grandparents and some even had them into adulthood, go to college, etc. those kind of observations) but I was disappointed by the last half even if it was very clearly thoroughly researched, it was dull and made even more dull by how good the first half was. I’ve worked in government and policy and even I can only read so much about taxes, medicare, and pensions without wanting to bang my head against the wall. The first half also compared boomer traits and behaviors with the DSM-V (diagnostic and statistical manual of mental disorders) which was fascinating but the author seemed to have given up on that in the last half.

The first half would have easily gotten 5 stars from me, but the rest was painfully boring. I guess I anticipated it to either be 1. more focused on Boomers culturally (Karens and such and how they were the first generation to grow up the way we do now) or 2. more medically focused on sociopathy as a disorder.

naomiwhit's review against another edition

This was just taking too long to read and preventing me from reading and doing things I actually enjoyed. Was an interesting perspective but I just didn't love it and wasn't fully invested in learning more after a point.