“No problem” vs “you’re welcome”
Speaking of linguistics, there’s one particular linguistic tick that I think clearly separates Baby Boomers from Millennials: how we reply when someone says “thank you.”
You almost never hear a Millennial say “you’re welcome.” At least not when someone thanks them. It just isn’t done. Not because Millennials are ingrates lacking all manners, but because the polite response is “No problem.” Millennials only use “you’re welcome” sarcastically when they haven’t been thanked or when something has been taken from/done to them without their consent. It’s a phrase that’s used to point out someone else’s rudeness. A Millennial would typically be fairly uncomfortable saying “you’re welcome” as an acknowledgement of genuine thanks because the phrase is only ever used disingenuously.
Baby Boomers, however, get really miffed if someone says “no problem” in response to being thanked. From their perspective, saying “no problem” means that whatever they’re thanking someone for was in fact a problem, but the other person did it anyway as a personal favor. To them “You’re welcome” is the standard polite response.
“You’re welcome” means to Millennials what “no problem” means to Baby Boomers, and vice versa.The two phrases have converse meanings to the different age sets. I’m not sure exactly where this line gets drawn, but it’s somewhere in the middle of Gen X. This is a real pain in the ass if you work in customer service because everyone thinks that everyone else is being rude when they’re really being polite in their own language.
Something interesting to note is also the more literal meaning behind these two phrases and how they themselves differ and oppose each other
‘No problem’, coming from a millennial’s mouth, within the context of helping someone – whether it be holding a door open/picking up something someone may have dropped/etc. – and, naturally, being thanked for it, implies that the kind gesture was indeed, not a problem, that it was just the thing to do, that they were happy to help and that no thanks was really necessary.
While a Baby Boomer’s ‘You’re welcome’ in contrast, says something miles different, it actually highlights the fact that the person went out of their way to help someone; almost brings attention to it in a way, saying ‘Yeah, I helped you, I did you this favor I accept your thanks.’ which, malicious intent or not, is strikingly different than the millennial downplay of their act of kindness for the sake of helping someone.
The broad class that these expressions belong to is that of phatic expressions, formulaic expressions that are used less for their literal meaning and more for their social contribution. Others include “hi/hello/good morning” and “how do you do?/how are you?/what’s up?/how’s it going?” (Fun experiment: next time someone asks you “what’s up?” try replying smoothly “good, how are are you?” – or the inverse, replying “not much, what’s up with you?” to “how are you?” – and see if they even notice.)
The sub-class of phatic expressions involving “you’re welcome” and “no problem” is known as minimizers, and “no problem” is indeed newer (although it seems to date to the 1980s, so it’s not a perfect correlation with Millennials). Other minimizers are “no worries”, “sure”, “my pleasure”, “okay”, “anytime”, “don’t mention it” and others in this list. Minimizers often vary by age, geographic location, and other factors: ”you’re welcome”, for example, isn’t so old either – the OED’s first citation for it is from 1907 (”my pleasure” and “don’t mention it” are older). Another which I’ve noticed Americans using over the past few years is “mmhm” or “uh-huh”, which I’ve never heard in Canada as a minimizer. That’s about all the research I can find on them at the moment – anyone know any more detailed studies?
In Spanish the response to “gracias” is usually “de nada” which is closer in meaning to “no problem” than to “you’re welcome.” It also is a minimizer. And essentially means no thanks is necessary. I’m older than sin and I have no problem at all with the response of “no problem” to “thank you.” I’m not sure a lot of people of my age actually do. It feels like another one of those false constructs intended to make people feel like they are the first and only to invent or use an expression.
What feels bad to me is no response at all or a barely audible grunt. Civility in general seems to be taking a dive at the moment while social awkwardness is glorified. Polite expressions are the social grease which smooths ordinary interactions between people. Being taught the automatic use of them as children seems good to me–”no problem” works fine in most cases. It’s not the choice of words that matters most but that a response of some sort is a basic requirement. However, the tendency at the moment seems to be that using any such formulaic expressions is insincere. I think that is just bullshit. We need those expressions to communicate simple respect for other people.
I love all of this but I felt the need to interject some former cashier-at-an-IHOP POV to the issue of how to negotiate this in customer service. I am part of the group that feels uncomfortable saying “You’re welcome” but also old enough that I have an equally ingrained sense of it being incorrect as well. Here is my solution for customer service situations: “My pleasure.”
