Clever investors have already identified the growing need for rest homes. As the huge baby boomer generation get out of employment, their children must ready themselves for the peril of visiting their beloved parents in a mint green-walled rest home.
While plenty of Baby Boomers will no doubt stave off the move as long as possible, soon enough Millennials will find themselves encountering the lingering smell of disinfectant, and clatter of Mah Jong tiles on a more frequent basis. Never mind the cost, encountering so many shuffling old people floating between bingo and pool aerobics classes is going to be a sobering experience.
When fashion recycles 2002 style
Based on recent trends, we like to look back about 20 years for fashion inspiration. That means the coming decade will see all those tacky early-noughties looks reincarnated. And it should have you worried.
Not even Paris Hilton looked good in dresses over hipster jeans. Let alone the 2002 penchant for bare bellies, bootleg cuts, pants so low on the hip you need a Brazilian wax, velour tracksuits and frosted tips. When Stripped-era Christina Aguilera becomes our 2020s style icon, we know we're at this trend's peak.
Roll your way to obesity
E-scooters look as normal in our modern landscapes as segways and electric bikes. The prevalence of on-demand rental vehicles is making travel inexpensive and accessible. But movement now does not even require us to push the peddles or walk that far.
As the next decade rolls around, our preference for electric vehicles seems likely to assist our obesity levels to new heights – or rather, new widths. Soon we'll be upping our daily need for 30 minutes exercise just to tackle the effects of all that time-saving electrified travel.
Big data dating
More and more our lives are recorded online permanently. Scrolling through Facebook you can see every dating triumph and failure in very public detail. With Tinder dating nearly the default for most relationships, compatibility seems likely to be the next victim of big data processing.
Companies have years of personal data to put through its paces and establish how suitable others around you are as potential partners. With plenty of attitudes evolving over privacy and how much to share with the world, it seems likely we will have our dating histories and compatibility data-points publicly available to speed up finding The One. It may even help us avoid those cringe-worthy dating fails we'd prefer never to mention again. Or it could be Black Mirror. Who knows.
You'll be a vegan without knowing it
Pulled pork-looking jackfruit is the meat substitute of the moment. Beyond Meat and Impossible Foods is creating burger patties so realistic they have beetroot juice to appear like blood. If you haven't had cashew cheese yet, you are truly missing out.
It is increasingly common for restaurants to have several plates free of animal products. Where political activists have failed to convince us, whole foods chefs are leading us all to a more vegan diet. So don't be surprised come 2029 to realise you gone days without cow's milk, beef, or eggs.
Another burnout
The world is already an overwhelming place as 2020 begins. Give it another ten years and we will all be so fatigued by the climate crisis, our own children and finally being in charge at work, that we'll just feel like giving up.
As millennials advance into high profile jobs and community roles, we are looking more and more likely to over-extend ourselves as we try to save the world, be highly successful, and still lead an Instagrammable life. Cue another Millennial Burnout.
Gen Z might be better than us
In saying that, Generation Z looks like its getting more done than we've been able to. Greta Thunberg was named Time's 2019 Person of the Year. Young people protested effectively enough for Scott Morrison to get home to sort out the Australian bushfires.
The momentum they're able to generate online behind a cause rapidly is all indicative of how they're resolved to getting things done. It'll fall to us to support these efforts and empower the next generation, because embracing Gen Z will likely solve more of the world's woes we could. Hey, at this rate, our next prime minister will probably be Lorde.
