The Sandwich Generation: The Beginning of the Great Devaluation

 

The Sandwich Generation: The Beginning of the Great Devaluation

The generation born between 1974 and 1978 is the original "sandwich" cohort—caught firmly between the high-flying legends of the past and the increasingly squeezed reality of the future. They entered university as the gates were finally swinging open, witnessing the rapid expansion of degree programs. But in this transition from "elite" to "mass" education, they suffered a subtle, psychological wound: they were the first to feel the creeping inflation of the diploma.

For the first time, a degree was no longer a guaranteed golden ticket; it was becoming a baseline requirement. They still enjoyed a high degree of economic mobility, and yes, they could still afford to buy property before their thirties. Yet, they lived under the long, judgmental shadow of the generation that preceded them—those who had bought at the bottom of the market and made their fortunes when the city was still a frontier.

The tragedy of the 1974–1978 generation is that they are the targets of a massive generational gaslighting. They worked just as hard as their predecessors, lived through the same frantic economic cycles, and built stable, middle-class lives. Yet, they are constantly held up against the "Golden Generation" as if they were a disappointment. They are the people who heard the phrase "you aren't as successful as your elders" until they started believing it themselves.

They represent the peak of the old order before the real crunch arrived. They were the last ones to cross the bridge before the toll became unaffordable. They are the unwitting bridge between the era of "limitless opportunity" and the era of "managed decline." History will likely remember them as the last group to enjoy a stable social contract in Hong Kong. They are the generation that tried to play by the rules, only to realize, halfway through the game, that the rules were being rewritten to favor the property owners and the financiers, leaving the rest to wonder why their own efforts yielded slightly less with every passing year.