Used to work in a fairly high end ski hotel. In February we would get dozens of little kids all going for ski lessons. I used to label their skis so they wouldn't get mixed up, but I always had to also ask the surname so I could write "Olivia T, Olivia M, Emily P, Olivia B, Emily H, Emily S" then start on the boys "Tom D, Tom A, Oliver G, Tom J, Oliver H...."
Also when someone asked me to get their luggage from the car - "It's a black Audi"
You don't fucking say. Which of the ten black Audis is it, Oli?
Don't get me started on the number of Toms, Olivers, and Olivias at my daughter's school.
When these kids start working in offices, is going to usher back in the day of calling all co-workers by their surname "Hey Jonson, I have that report for you from Smith. Thanks Brown."
I think they used to do that back in the 70s and 80s because everyones firsnames were all James, and Peter.
Brandon, Ryan, and Aaron for guys, Christine, Sarah, and Kat for girls. Kat gets more of a mention here because it's a short version of Kate which is a short version of Kathy which is a short version of Katherine. And when you combine those, that's like 50% of every generation.
Wait, Gen X had all the Kylies? That sounds characteristically Gen Y/Z.
Guess when I was born... Went to school with James, William, Dan, John, Joseph, David, Elizabeth, Lisa, Margaret, Debbie, Carolyn, Bonnie, Susan, Karen, Michael, and Peter. Most of the Karens I knew were nice people. They don't deserve the bad rap.
Those dude names are common across generations. Debbie and Lisa were popular baby names in the 50s & 60s, Margaret and Carolyn too. I'm guessing you graduated high school around 1975-1980.
Millennial here, I've noticed a lot of Stephanies, Sams, Alexes, Chloes, and Michelles. Matthew seemed like a particularly popular one - at one point we had 3 Matthews in the same class (about 25 students), and I had 2 Matthews in my immediate friend group in college.
Edit: Rachel/Rachael was another common one, had a couple of those in my friend group at one point too
In NJ it was Katherine/Katie, Jennifer, Jessica, Melissa, Heather, Stephanie, and there were a fair number of Tiffanys too. Soooo many Chrises, plus Matt, Jason, Rob, Nick, Alex.
Far too many of the classmates I had in high school who had kids hella early all named their kids "Jayden" if it was a boy or "Skylar" if it was a girl.