Few things are as painless to prepare as cereal.

Making it requires little more than pouring

something (a cereal of your choice) into a bowl and then pouring something else (a milk of your
choice) into the same bowl. Eating it requires little more than a spoon and your mouth. The food,
which Americans still buy $10 billion of annually, has thrived over the decades, at least in part,
because of this very quality: its convenience.

And yet, for today's youth, cereal isn't easy enough. On Monday, the New York Times published a
story about the breakfast favorite, and the most disconcerting part was this: Almost 40 percent of
the millennials surveyed by Mintel for its 2015 report said cereal was an inconvenient breakfast
choice because they had to clean up after eating it.

The industry, the piece explained, is struggling — sales have tumbled by almost 30 percent over
the past 15 years, and the future remains uncertain. And the reasons are largely those one would
expect: Many people are eating breakfast away from the home, choosing breakfast sandwiches and
yogurt instead of more traditional morning staples. Many others, meanwhile, too busy to pay
attention to their stomachs, are eating breakfast not at all.

But there is another thing happening, which should scare cereal makers — and, really, anyone who
has a stake in this country's future — more: A large contingent of millennials are uninterested in
breakfast cereal because eating it means using a bowl, and bowls don't clean themselves (or get
tossed in the garbage). Bowls, kids these days groan, have to be cleaned.

Cereal isn't the only food suffering from a national trend toward laziness. Coffee has suffered a
similar fate. Despite talk of a third wave of coffee, which values quality above all else, and basks in
artisanal rather than effortless methods of preparation, Americans still covet convenience above all
else. "Convenience is the one thing that’s really changing trends these days," Howard Telford, an
industry analyst at market research firm Euromonitor, said last year. Less than 10 percent of the
coffee beans Americans buy are fresh whole beans. And ground coffee isn't just outpacing whole
bean coffee — it's increasing its lead, each and every year.

The rise of coffee pods, which come pre-ground and produce a cup of brown caffeinated water
with the push of a button, is further evidence of the country's desire for convenience. Sales of coffee
pods grew by 138,324 percent between 2004 and 2014, according to data from Euromonitor. The
popularity of delivery, meanwhile, speaks to the same tendency toward convenience. Roughly 15
percent of restaurant meals are delivered today, according to data from Technomic. But among
millennials the percentage is higher: more like 20 percent.

The reason why convenience is increasingly important isn't merely because people are lazy —
many actually need it. Families are working more than ever. Almost two-thirds of households are
supported by two working parents today, according to the latest government data, which is the
highest reading on record. The less time families have to prepare food or sit down at restaurants, the
more convenience hovers over decisions about food, especially when there is an option that is
easier. Dinner, which isn't being cooked at home as often as it used to, is among the trend's many
casualties. Less than 60 percent of suppers served at home were actually cooked at home last year.
Only 30 years ago, the percentage was closer to 75 percent.

But there is something different about the backlash against cereal bowls, something more
foundational about it that seems to speak to a greater truth about American households today. A
2014 national survey, conducted by Braun Research, found that 82 percent of parents said they were
asked to do chores as children. But when they were asked if they required their children to do
chores, only 28 percent of them said yes. And this generational shift in how families raise their kids
seems to be turning even the most mundane of responsibilities, like doing the dishes, into
unthinkable nuisances.

Ultimately, cereal makers will settle on a strategy for reversing the industry's downward trend.
Among the likeliest routes are embracing the fact that many people are eating the food at times
other than breakfast, often as a snack, channeling the food's nostalgic quality, which helped buoy
the industry for years, and shifting to portable containers, which nearly half of millennials prefer,
according to Mintel. No matter the result, America's youth might have to reckon with the
consequences of an age in which it's no longer worth eating a food when it means having to clean a
plate. Maybe Soylent is the future after all.