The evidence is becoming increasingly clear that baby boomers are America’s worst generation. To keep the trend going they’ve turned to buying a lot of RVs.


It should be said that RVs aren’t as bad as some other things that baby boomers are responsible for, like Trump and Rolling Stone magazine, but RVs are also big and clunky and churn through a lot of gas and probably represent the opposite direction we want to go in as far as transportation goes. Which means, of course, that baby boomers can’t stop snapping them up.

From Reuters:

Shipments of RVs in 2017 are expected to hit their highest in nearly four decades, according to data from the Recreation Vehicle Industry Association. That would mark the eighth straight year of growth. RV shipments are expected to hit 505,600 in 2017, a 17.4 percent jump from last year, and then hit 520,700 in 2018, according to the association. “Each and every month this year was the best on comparable record for that month,” said Frank Hugelmeyer, the RVIA’s president, speaking at a trade show in Louisville,


Over half a million RVs! Sheesh. Is there any good news here?

Low gasoline prices have helped fuel sales in recent years, as have low interest rates that have eased financing of items that range in price from $10,000 to $1 million. The vast bulk of shipments - an estimated 444,100 units this year - are so-called towables. The rest are motor homes.

So only around 60,000 are actual, you know, motor homes. Can you imagine 60,000 motor homes in one place? As Reuters notes, RV manufacturing “is heavily concentrated in northern Indiana, which produces about 85 percent of the U.S.’s RVs.” Indeed, drive Interstate 90 some time when you get a chance. Eventually, you’ll get an RV eyeful.