Damn, you're good. Just ask you.
You have plenty of sex.
You drink booze a lot and you're always eating in restaurants.
But don't worry, you say, all the exercise you do balances it out. You're in tip-top shape. Much better than your own parents were.
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Getting on in years? Forget that. You don't think you're old. Not even close. Hell, almost a 10th of you still feel like you're in your 20s.
You are friendly and generous, you tell us. Very ambitious yet not materialistic. And, oh yes, your kids are your best friends.
You, of course, are the baby boomers. And judging by a recent Globe and Mail/Strategic Counsel poll, you are either the most optimistic generation ever to walk the Earth or the most self-deluded.
Despite what the boomers tell us, they are, in fact, an unhealthy lot over all. Diabetes and obesity levels are rising compared with previous generations. As for their generosity, Statistics Canada says the number of Canadians giving to charity has dropped to 25 per cent today from 29 per cent in 1987.
In the Strategic Counsel poll, which surveyed 1,502 people and is considered accurate to within 2.5 percentage points, 19 times out of 20, boomers said their kids love them, they really, really love them. Forty-nine per cent believe they have a better relationship with their kids than they had with their parents. More than half claim they listen to similar music. Sixty per cent of boomers believe their adolescent or adult kids “enjoy their company very much.” Only 1 per cent admit their kids can't stand them.
Maybe the kids can't afford to feel otherwise. Most of them are still living at home. Sixty-four per cent of boomers with children still have at least some of their brood in the house. Even when the kids are gone, though, it looks like they will still be helping with the bills. While 82 per cent of boomers expect their financial assistance to their children to end within the next 10 years, three-fifths of them are already giving financial support to kids over 18.
Boomers seem to think the Summer of Love never ended, even if they're getting some help from Viagra these days. About a quarter of them say they're still having sex at least three times a week. A majority claim to be sexually active.
And more than half of boomers aged 50 to 59 think of themselves as younger than they are.
Never mind that people tend to inflate their rate of sexual activities in surveys. The boomers were once sexual revolutionaries and have a reputation to uphold. According to another recent study funded by Viagra manufacturer Pfizer, 66 per cent of Canadians over 40 years old claimed to be sexually satisfied.
However, a different study published in the Canadian Journal of Sexuality found that 48 per cent of university-educated women have lower sex drives than they would like.
If you don't want sex, there's always dinner, and dining out is another one of the boomers' favourite things to do. Three-quarters of them go out for a meal at least once a week. And about 10 per cent hit a restaurant three or more times.
They also tend to get around. The majority say they are more likely to travel than their parents.
Boomers still like to drink. Almost a quarter have a tipple at least three times a week.
That's more than their own kids, the Echo Generation (aged 18 to 29) and more than the 30-to-39-year-olds. “What's wrong with a glass of wine now and then?” the boomer asks. No doubt they've read plenty of studies suggesting that moderate drinking is actually good for you.
There are some vices the boomers have given up. Most of them stopped smoking years ago. Just 27 per cent said they have had a puff within the last week.
And they say they don't smoke marijuana any more. Ninety-four per cent say they never touch the stuff.
Yet a Canadian Addiction Survey recently found that pot use among Canadians had doubled in a decade, with 45 per cent of respondents using cannabis at least once within the last year. The same survey indicated that pot is a drug of choice among the middle-aged and better-educated, and that marijuana use increases with schooling, rising to 52 per cent for those with postsecondary education.
If they're fibbing about pot, the boomers may also be stretching the truth about their health.
Most think they'll be with us well into their 70s and 80s and 15 per cent believe they'll make it to 90 years old.
It must be all that working out they do. Four-fifths say they exercise at least once a week and most say more than three times.
Yet government figures indicate that 52 per cent of 45-to-59-year-olds are couch potatoes. Only 43 per cent of the same age group lived a sedentary lifestyle 10 years ago.
“If you ask them, they'll say I'm fit, I'm lean, nothing bad is going to happen to me,” said Ian Janssen, a professor and epidemiologist at Queen's University who has studied the health of the boomers. “However, when you measure the actual health of the boomers, you get a completely different story.”
Almost 40 per cent of boomers said they have become more anti-government over the years, yet the majority feel they are also more tolerant. Almost half of them describe themselves as liberal, while more than a third also say they have become more conservative.
Despite boomers' optimism, the poll showed them to be a stressed generation, struggling to balance the needs of their parents and their children while worrying about retirement. Forty-five per cent of boomers polled said they are putting in more hours at the office than their parents did, and more than half of those with homes are still paying off their mortgages. Almost 80 per cent think they will have it taken care of by the time they retire.
Among boomers with parents who are still alive, a quarter have one or more parents that need their assistance on a regular basis.
A fifth have no savings or investments, and the most privileged, self-assured generation in a century scored lowest among all age groups when it comes to confidence that they will have enough money to retire on. Only 28 per cent of boomers are very confident that they will be financially secure in old age, compared with about 41 per cent of those belonging to younger generations and 47 per cent of those older than boomers.
Between financial concerns and time demands from kids and aging parents, one might expect boomers to have turned gloomy. Indeed, more than half of all people 40 to 60 years old who visited the doctor in 2005 were diagnosed with some form of depression, according to IMS Health, a private health-information company.
Yet you are a sanguine bunch, you boomers. Almost all of you claim to be very satisfied or somewhat satisfied with your lives, and most of you think that things will get better from here.
No wonder.
You're living in denial.
Andy Hoffman is a reporter in The Globe and Mail's Report on Business.
