I see a worrisome trend. On one hand, many of my proto-boomer friends are suffering from age-ism , and memes claim that over-50-year-olds are unemployable. Not 100% fidelity, but there's some truth.

Then I hear about a lot of youngsters struggling to find work, and see articles like this.

Well, who's left? Is there a sweet spot at like 31 that are just cleaning up?

31 would line up with the post house bubble boom recovery

beside the point, but over 50 = proto-boomer? You mean para-boomer, maybe? Gen X is <=60, I believe, so you referring to the cusp boomer/genx I think..

genx is now proto-boomer

Proto as a prefix means it's first or at least before.

I do not think that word means what you think it means. Proto boomer would be pre-boomer or at least the very early boomer, and chronologically that makes zero sense. Understand what you're trying to say though -- Quasi, Para, Pseudo, Demi would each be more appropriate prefixes. A Demiboomer could be in the Monster Manual.

boomer-adjacent seemed like a mouthful