Millennium May Create Bad Vibes

There may be a celestial explanation for those bad vibes you’ve been having since New Year’s Day: Maybe it has to do with the coming millennium, trend-watchers say.

That momentous event - the end of a thousand-year cycle or the beginning of another - arrives in the year 2000. People’s awareness of it will begin in earnest this year, according to the Trends Research Institute.

“Something really different does happen, according to history, when those 1,000-year marks hit,” said Gerald Celente, editor of the institute’s Trends Journal.

“The most prominent aspect is that it will be an official demarcation to the end of an age. It will clearly end the Industrial Age - to be replaced by the Global Age,” Celente said.

Some Christians will regard the turn of the century as the approach of the apocalypse, Celente said, because the Bible’s Book of Revelations predicts that Jesus Christ will reign on Earth for 1,000 years.

Others will see it as the true arrival of the Age of Aquarius, the beginning of a 2,100-year era of peace, wisdom and communal effort.

Meanwhile, pessimism will prevail in 1995, Celente predicts.

“Although domestic issues will be predominant in the culture, we won’t escape the conflicts going on in the world theater,” he said.

That political and economic upheaval in the world’s trouble spots, Celente added, will make immigration demands an increasingly difficult problem.

“There are 20 million refugees scouring the Earth looking for a place to live.”

The institute, based in Rhinebeck, N.Y., identifies and tracks modern trends using news reports, public opinion polls and other means.

Among top trends the institute sees for 1995:

The economy. The quest for the trade dollar will continue to smash ideological barriers: The U.S. lifted its trade embargo against Vietnam, the Arab League may eliminate its economic boycott of Israel and so forth.

Longevity. This year will bring more emphasis on older people’s health, fitness and nutrition, and a boon for the New Age wellness movement.

Economic Fallback. “Legions” of Americans will slide from middle- to lower-class in 1995 and into the next decade.

Homing. More people will work at home.

Green Rebirth. Environmentalism will rebound because of improved business opportunities for “green” companies.

Responsibility Tax. People’s resentment at paying for government services they don’t use - such as childless people paying school taxes - will result in more of the tax burden falling on people who enjoy the benefits.