Photo: Via @ya_books_rule.Millennial-bashing. It's practically a hobby for people of a certain age with a lot of opinions and little information. "Narcissistic and entitled," they whine, while rushing past a mirror. But, there's one complaint that stings: that Millennials don't read.
Except, we do. We do read. We read things like studies from the Pew Research Center that say 88% of Americans under 30 read a book a last year, while only 79% of those over 30 did. So, there.
Okay, that's not a giant lead, but it's still significant. And, for a group maligned for its listicles and quizticles, this is a real #win. In fact, the study — which surveyed 6,000 Americans — was pretty encouraging all-around. (Or, maybe our expectations were just too low?) Either way, more than three-quarters of Americans picking up books is good news.
The big thing on decline, however, are libraries, which might soon join malls in a museum of 20th-century relics. People are relying on them less and less and buying books (or, more likely, downloading them) more. And, while that may sound like an inevitable byproduct of Internet proliferation that we need not mourn, it isn't exactly progress — not when you consider that the people most likely to rate library services as "very important" are in lower-income brackets.
But, in another coup for millennials, the under-30s were more likely to still find value in libraries, saying they offer "a lot of useful, important information that is not available on the Internet." Now, if only all their services could be online, we might finally be able to call this the 21st century. (The Atlantic)