Yawns: young, wealthy, normal and display a social conscience

Article from The London Free Press

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Fri, May 2, 2008
By EVELYN NIEVES, AP


SAN FRANCISCO -- They drive hybrid cars, if they drive at all, shop at local stores, if they shop at all and pay off their credit cards every month, if they use them at all.

They may have disposable income but whatever they make, they live below their means, in a conscious effort to tread lightly on the earth.

They are a new breed of Gen Xers and Ys, Young and Wealthy but Normal, or Yawns.

The acronym comes from The Sunday Telegraph of London, which noted an increasing number of rich young Britons are socially aware, concerned about the environment and given less to consuming than to giving money to charity.

Yawns sound dull but the their dreams big and bold. They are men and women in their 20s, 30s and 40s who want to change the world and save the planet.

Take Sean Blagsvedt, who moved from Seattle to India in 2004 to help build the local office of Microsoft Research. Moved by children begging on the streets, Blagsvedt quit Microsoft and launched two networking sites, babajob.com and babalife.com, to link India's vast pool of potential workers with the people who need labour.

Far from the techie cafe life, Blagsvedt, 32, lives at babajob's headquarters in Bangalore, a 278-square-metre apartment where his mother and stepfather also live and 15 workers come and go every day.

"I'm a happy person," he said. "It's great to do something that you believe in doing."

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I really like this idea of living below our means in order to help the environment