Linchi Kwok, Ph.D.

The new COVID-19 cases finally showed signs of declines across the U.S., but definitely, we should still take cautionary measures to avoid another wave of infections. Now, some people have already claimed that this pandemic would forever change the travel industry .   Because the coronavirus is primarily transmitted through direct or indirect close contact with infected people via mouth or nose secretions, social distancing and frequent sanitation are highly recommended. It is not surprising to see consumers demand services with minimum human contact, which in turn promotes contactless self-services. Restaurants Mobile ordering , for example, has been introduced to the market way before COVID-19 hit, but all of a sudden, it became the safest method of payment during the pandemic as it requires little or no human contact. A recent analysis of 100,000 reviews in Apple’s App Store revealed that there was a 36% year-to-year increase in the number of reviewers saying that it was th...

Jill Filipovic argued in her new book - OK Boomers, Let’s Talk: How My Generation Got Left Behind - that millennials have been going through tougher economic circumstances than any other generations since the Great Depression. I am neither a millennial nor a Boomer, but the media coverage about Jill’s arguments got my attention. The fact is no matter if we are in the position of supporting or challenging Jill’s propositions, we cannot deny that we need Boomers to boost post-pandemic consumption . Besides millennials and Gen Zers , Baby Boomers also deserve big attention from businesses. Boomers have time and money   Boomers, now aged between 56 and 74 (or 77, depending on which cutoff point we are using), composed of 71.6 million of the U.S. population, according to the July 2019 data from the U.S. Census Bureau and the Pew Research Center . Boomers are now behind the millennials, whose population had reached 72.1 million.    While the COVID-19 has pushed more people t...