2005 

1945: It was a time of greats. The Great War had just ended and the greatest generation (Brokaw, 1998) was headed home victorious. The greatest numbers of women were also returning home from working in the factories that helped to win the War. Together, those
who fought and those who supplied them came together to build homes and families that produced the greatest number of children born in an 18-year period that this country has ever known.

Little did these parents of the 76,000,000 children born between 1946 and 1964 know what challenges their progeny would produce in the future. These enormous numbers of people have become known, for obvious reasons, as the baby boomers.

Now, in 2005, as the first wave of this 25% of the U.S. population turns 60 years of age in 2006, their very numbers will cause tremendous challenges to society, the economy, health care, retirement sources in general, and to our profession of counseling in
particular.