"There are two Gen Zs"
Gen Z data showing a schism that the elder Zs trended more liberal and the younger Zs trended more conservative/Trump-y.
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"I’m a millennial who attended Z-Con, a conference for Gen Z creators and activists. Here’s what I learned"
Enter Z-Con, a two-day affair hosted by United Talent Agency last week that billed itself as an event designed by Gen Z, for Gen Z, uniting hundreds of creators, activists, influencers, marketers, and executives. Z-Con's organizers sought to reclaim the mic and pass it among their generation to speak for themselves: It aimed to connect young leaders across a variety of industries with businesses to help marketers meaningfully connect with Gen Z.
The event was driven by NextGen, the entertainment marketing arm at United Talent Agency formerly known as JUV Consulting. The agency was founded by Ziad Ahmed and Shaina Zafar while the two were in high school and was eventually acquired in March 2024 by UTA.
It wasn't too long ago that millennials were the newcomers to the workforce and the focus of constant media attention: We were the generation bringing real change to the corporate world and beyond, acknowledging our mental health and setting boundaries, while maintaining our side-hustle culture mantras and supposedly thriving in a limitless girl-boss era. (Never mind that many millennials came of age in the 2008 recession and had no choice but to pick up second or third gigs to make ends meet.) These were traits that we proudly wore on our sleeves until we eventually became the burnout generation.
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Why Gen-Z and Millenials might be seen as Entitled
This post looks at the perception of "entitlement" among Millenials and Gen-Z. The author, Ted Lamade highlights the fact that for the past 15ish years, the economy has been very solid and mass layoffs haven't happened. This, he says, is part of the reason the young generations (myself included, sort of) have (as you'll read) a high confidence in their ability and bargaining power.
Now, I will note, as an "elder millenial" I worked (and was laid off) during the great recession. So, I am aware of what it can mean. However, I do take Lamade's point that this might be part of why older works perceive younger ones as "entitled." Not something I had considered before.
While it's a bit harsh to label these generations "entitled", they do have something in common that can give off this impression. Something that binds them. Something that explains the heated responses in the bar — given the strength of the U.S. economy over the past decade-and-a-half, these two generations have yet to experience or witness sustained professional loss (Covid was clearly traumatic, but the recovery was swift given the degree of fiscal and monetary support).
This means that the youngest part of the U.S. workforce hasn't experienced large scale layoffs, seen what effective leadership amidst a pronounced economic downturn looks like, witnessed strong mentorship during these moments, watched teams rally together, and ultimately seen the impact these experiences can have on their careers. The work-from-home phenomenon has only exacerbated this phenomenon.
The result?
This sustained economic expansion has created two generations that are more confident in their own ability and bargaining position than any in quite a while.
Yet, change might be afoot. If this current economic slowdown persists (especially in the tech world), I expect to see some significant changes in the coming months and quarters, with one of the first being a migration back into the office.
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"How Gen Z teens accidentally blew up the myth of the lazy millennial"
When the first millennials turned 16 in 1997, teen employment was above 43 percent. When the last of their generation hit 16 in 2014, it had plunged to around 26 percent. But as the first zoomers entered the workforce, the employment rate suddenly began to climb again. It now stands around 33 percent and is seeing its first sustained growth in decades.
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Millennials entered the workforce amid two significant recessions and the jobless recoveries that followed, meaning they were always pitted against legions of laid-off, more-experienced workers, said Northeastern University economist Alicia Sasser Modestino.
Millennial teens also faced stiff competition from another huge reservoir of talented, hard-working adult competitors, said Hande Inanc, a Mathematica senior researcher who tracks youth unemployment trends. The immigrant population soared throughout the millennial era, with the foreign-born share of the population peaking in 2018 at its highest level since at least 1850. It has declined since, due in part to Trump-era immigration policies and restrictions related to the coronavirus pandemic.
Meanwhile, many of the entry-level jobs that drew Gen X into the workforce began evaporating as millennials hit the job market, Modestino said. Low-wage teen workers at video-rental stores were replaced by a few high-wage adult programmers at a few video-streaming giants. Paper carriers were similarly phased out in favor of highly skilled adults who make newspapers available online, delivered by internet protocols rather than by bicycle.
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