美国国家公共电台 NPR As Millennials Get Older, Many Are Buying SUVs To Drive To Their Suburban Homes

 

AILSA CHANG, HOST:

Millennials are beginning to act more like their parents. This is the generation that was born after 1980. They came of age during the Great Recession. And now, as they grow older and have children, many are doing things like buying SUVs and homes. NPR's Sonari Glinton takes a look.

SONARI GLINTON, BYLINE¹: For the last decade or so we've heard a lot about how millennials are different from the rest of us. As a matter of fact, I've even done some of that reporting. And it turns out, well, not so much.

MICHELLE KREBS: Millennials are pretty mainstream² when it gets right down to it, especially when they start creating households and having families.

GLINTON: So who are you (laughter)?

KREBS: Who am I? I'm Michelle Krebs, executive analyst³ with AutoTrader. And remember that this is the generation that just got clobbered⁵ during the Great Recession. They came out of college just loaded down with debt. And they were unemployed⁶, underemployed, moving back in with mom and dad. So they were set behind economically.

GLINTON: Krebs says this kept millennials out of the car market. But that's changing. In 2011, Krebs says millennials were 20 percent of the market. They're about 30 now. They'll be 40 percent of the market before the next decade if current trends continue. Growing older also is beginning to mean buying a house in the suburbs, says Svenja Gudell, the chief economist⁷ with Zillow.

SVENJA GUDELL: When it comes time for millennials to actually purchase a home, oftentimes they choose suburbs over urban neighborhoods.

GLINTON: Zillow, by the way, is the real estate site. Gudell says millennials as a generation were scarred by the last Great Recession.

GUDELL: If you graduate into a recession, your lifetime earnings⁸ are likely to be lower than someone who doesn't graduate into a recession.

GLINTON: The car and housing surveys show that the result of that scarring is millennials are much more budget-conscious than their older siblings⁹, Gen Xers, and their baby boomer parents. The recession acted kind of as a big pause button for many choices Gudell says millennials were already going to be slow to make.

GUDELL: They end up dating for a longer amount of time before they actually end up getting married. And then we're seeing that the age at which women have kids has also gone up. And so instead of having children in your late 20s, you might start having kids when you're in your early 30s at this point.

GLINTON: Now, it's important to note that all millennials haven't given up their fixed-gear bikes and their downtown lofts¹⁰. It's the oldest millennials who are entering a sort of key age, over 35. Now, depending on who you talk to, the oldest millennials are 37. As they cross that threshold Erich Merkle, an economist with Ford¹¹, says the group is buying SUVs - large ones. And the best-seller for millennials for Ford is their large SUV, the Explorer.

ERICH MERKLE: We expect them to carry on as they age with three-row SUVs and likely go larger simply because they need the space that - to accommodate children that are now teenagers or preteenagers.

GLINTON: This all seems good for the car companies, right? Well, Michelle Krebs, the auto⁴ analyst, says not so fast.

KREBS: We know that millennials will buy one car. Will they be like the baby boomers and have 2, 3 or more cars in the driveway, in the household fleet?

GLINTON: That's kind of the looming¹² trillion-dollar question for the auto industry. Though as a Gen Xer, it's kind of fun to think millennials aren't that special. Sonari Glinton, NPR News.

(SOUNDBITE OF ARCHITECTURE IN HELSINKI SONG, "DO THE WHIRLWIND")

1 byline   

n.署名；v.署名

参考例句：

• His byline was absent as well.他的署名也不见了。
• We wish to thank the author of this article which carries no byline.我们要感谢这篇文章的那位没有署名的作者。

2 mainstream   

n.（思想或行为的）主流；adj.主流的

参考例句：

• Their views lie outside the mainstream of current medical opinion.他们的观点不属于当今医学界观点的主流。
• Polls are still largely reflects the mainstream sentiment.民调还在很大程度上反映了社会主流情绪。

3 analyst   

n.分析家，化验员；心理分析学家

参考例句：

• What can you contribute to the position of a market analyst?你有什么技能可有助于市场分析员的职务？
• The analyst is required to interpolate values between standards.分析人员需要在这些标准中插入一些值。

4 auto   

n.(=automobile)(口语)汽车

参考例句：

• Don't park your auto here.别把你的汽车停在这儿。
• The auto industry has brought many people to Detroit.汽车工业把许多人吸引到了底特律。

5 clobbered   

v.狠揍， （不停）猛打( clobber的过去式和过去分词 )；彻底击败

参考例句：

• The paper got clobbered with libel damages of half a million pounds. 这家报纸被罚以五十万英镑的诽谤损害赔偿金。
• The robbers clobbered the shopkeeper to make him open the safe. 强盗们殴打店主迫使他打开保险箱。 来自辞典例句

6 unemployed   

adj.失业的，没有工作的；未动用的，闲置的

参考例句：

• There are now over four million unemployed workers in this country.这个国家现有四百万失业人员。
• The unemployed hunger for jobs.失业者渴望得到工作。

7 economist   

n.经济学家，经济专家，节俭的人

参考例句：

• He cast a professional economist's eyes on the problem.他以经济学行家的眼光审视这个问题。
• He's an economist who thinks he knows all the answers.他是个经济学家，自以为什么都懂。

8 earnings   

n.工资收人；利润，利益，所得

参考例句：

• That old man lives on the earnings of his daughter.那个老人靠他女儿的收入维持生活。
• Last year there was a 20% decrease in his earnings.去年他的收入减少了20%。

9 siblings   

n.兄弟，姐妹( sibling的名词复数 )

参考例句：

• A triplet sleeps amongst its two siblings. 一个三胞胎睡在其两个同胞之间。 来自《简明英汉词典》
• She has no way of tracking the donor or her half-siblings down. 她没办法找到那个捐精者或她的兄弟姐妹。 来自时文部分

10 lofts   

阁楼( loft的名词复数 )； （由工厂等改建的）套房； 上层楼面； 房间的越层

参考例句：

• He lofts it into the air, and hugs his head in the deep secret embrace. 他抬手甩了出去，然后赶忙把头紧紧的抱了个密不透风。
• Spring Loaded Bed Loft-Lofts bed, freeing up extra storage space underneath. 弹性床铺抬高器---抬高床铺，释放更多床底下的空间。

11 Ford   

n.浅滩，水浅可涉处；v.涉水，涉过

参考例句：

• They were guarding the bridge,so we forded the river.他们驻守在那座桥上，所以我们只能涉水过河。
• If you decide to ford a stream,be extremely careful.如果已决定要涉过小溪，必须极度小心。

12 looming   

n.上现蜃景（光通过低层大气发生异常折射形成的一种海市蜃楼）v.隐约出现，阴森地逼近( loom的现在分词 )；隐约出现，阴森地逼近

参考例句：

• The foothills were looming ahead through the haze. 丘陵地带透过薄雾朦胧地出现在眼前。 来自《简明英汉词典》
• Then they looked up. Looming above them was Mount Proteome. 接着他们往上看，在其上隐约看到的是蛋白质组山。 来自英汉非文学 - 生命科学 - 回顾与展望