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Millennials and Gen Z Increasingly Pessimistic About Their Lives, Survey Finds

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Re: Millennials and Gen Z Increasingly Pessimistic About Their Lives, Survey Finds

#61

Post by jakeogh »

makerofspoons wrote: post #30

"Climate change, protecting the environment and natural disasters topped the list of most respondents on a personal level, but less than three in ten of both the Millennial and Gen Z cohorts cited it as a worry." This is surprising. As a Gen Z-er this highlights the kind of bubble I find myself in- my friend group is almost universally in a state of despair about the collapsing biosphere. Climate change and mass exti…

In elementary (late 80's) were constantly propagandized that the whales were going to be extinct, the ozone layer was going to be gone, and killer bees were going to get us all.

Not a peep of optimism that we could solve problems. It was presented as inevitable.

There are strong forces that need people to be in a constant state of worry. Power is derived from it.

Re: Millennials and Gen Z Increasingly Pessimistic About Their Lives, Survey Finds

#62

Post by crooked-v »

shanusmagnus wrote: post #58
syn0byte wrote: post #15

A single mother working as a waitress at Denny's in the 1980's had more spending power than a college educated cubicle drone in 2019; Let's talk about how is social media's fault! Twice in the last 20 years - more than any other time in US history combined - The Presidential election went to the candidate that LOST the popular vote; These generations just lack a proper understanding of civics! The beatings will conti…

This "losing the popular vote" narrative would be a lot more compelling (at least to me) if the elections were less close. It looks bad to win the Presidency and lose the popular vote, but I don't think it actually matters. In a nation of 300 something million, close enough to half want either candidate. The problems lie elsewhere. (The fact that I can say "either candidate" is part of it.) [Edit: I should have said…

First-past-the-post voting makes "either candidate" inevitable. The only real way to fix it is to switch to instant runoff voting, proportional voting with parliamentary coalitions, or other systems that represent voter desires in a proportional or ranked way.

Re: Millennials and Gen Z Increasingly Pessimistic About Their Lives, Survey Finds

#63

Post by challenger22 »

syn0byte wrote: post #15

A single mother working as a waitress at Denny's in the 1980's had more spending power than a college educated cubicle drone in 2019; Let's talk about how is social media's fault! Twice in the last 20 years - more than any other time in US history combined - The Presidential election went to the candidate that LOST the popular vote; These generations just lack a proper understanding of civics! The beatings will conti…

If you let sensationalized news stories dominate your worldview, you will give in to apathy. If your strongest moral convictions are about events you cannot influence, redirect those convictions to something that is inside your locus of control.

What I urge people is: be conscientious in your day-to-day tasks. If you can see your efforts contributing to people's happiness, the apathy will disappear. Society is built of individuals; if these bricks do not care for the health of the structure, it will sag or collapse.

Re: Millennials and Gen Z Increasingly Pessimistic About Their Lives, Survey Finds

#64

Post by rawrmaan »

Consultant32452 wrote: post #52
WhompingWindows wrote: post #9

Social media's ills, rising wealth and income inequality, rising sea levels, mass extinction event, crumbling roads, shit wages, corruption in government and industry, governments overwhelmingly filled with representatives of other generations with different priorities...there is a huge list of reasons to be pessimistic and they are constantly thrown in our faces online.

Constantly hitting records for economic highs. Lowest unemployment rate for blacks and Hispanics in the history of recorded unemployment rates. Rising wages. Just took a huge step in eradicating HIV in the US by securing free treatment for 200k poor people every year. Between the technological advances in solar/wind/batter, renewed interest in nuclear, and shrinking CO2 it seems climate change is well on its way to b…

> shrinking CO2

[citation needed]

Global CO2 emissions are nowhere near peaking, let alone shrinking.

Re: Millennials and Gen Z Increasingly Pessimistic About Their Lives, Survey Finds

#65

Post by 9HZZRfNlpR »

syn0byte wrote: post #15

A single mother working as a waitress at Denny's in the 1980's had more spending power than a college educated cubicle drone in 2019; Let's talk about how is social media's fault! Twice in the last 20 years - more than any other time in US history combined - The Presidential election went to the candidate that LOST the popular vote; These generations just lack a proper understanding of civics! The beatings will conti…

People's homes were much less luxurious, as their lifestyle. A lot of the things we take for granted the people at the time they only dreamed about.

Re: Millennials and Gen Z Increasingly Pessimistic About Their Lives, Survey Finds

#66

Post by simmanian »

austincheney wrote: post #34
WhompingWindows wrote: post #9

Social media's ills, rising wealth and income inequality, rising sea levels, mass extinction event, crumbling roads, shit wages, corruption in government and industry, governments overwhelmingly filled with representatives of other generations with different priorities...there is a huge list of reasons to be pessimistic and they are constantly thrown in our faces online.

It’s really hard to take that seriously. If social media is causing you heartburn then back away from it or delete your accounts. I deleted my Facebook account nearly a decade ago and deleted my Reddit account last year. Nobody is forcing you to be a drug addict slave of online media. Some of your list looks like entitled anxiety desperately in search of sympathy. For example you mention rising sea levels. Do you own…

>For example you mention rising sea levels. Do you own ocean front property or did you just list that for some abstract reason?

I agree that we need balance in everything, but it's not too far fetched to think climate change will lead to mass refugee movements and result in a pretty turbulent world.

Re: Millennials and Gen Z Increasingly Pessimistic About Their Lives, Survey Finds

#67

Post by noonespecial »

oldjokes wrote: post #20
luckydata wrote: post #13

Earlier quoted context omitted.

maybe we're also the first generation in a while that's seeing things considered normal by our parents systematically out of reach? Maybe we're a little pissed off that the implicit promise society made us if we "worked hard and played by the rules" like politicians like to say is being systematically broken? It's pretty clear it's not just the way we fell about things, we're objectively worse off than the previous c…

I hear this complaint a lot, but never really any details. What specifically are you mad about being out of reach and which metrics do you think you're worse off on compared to previous generations? Honest question. Is it just materials and money per person? Something more?

Can't give you solid numbers, but I'll tell you what it feels like: Housing costs everything I've got, Medicine is going to cost everything I'm going to have, and the proceeds of any advanced education I get will belong to a bank, not to me.

Re: Millennials and Gen Z Increasingly Pessimistic About Their Lives, Survey Finds

#68

Post by 765hgf »

rubicon33 wrote: post #38

My wife and I are not having kids. If you could sum it up into one short explanation as to why: My wife and I don't believe that the future is going to be a better place. Chief among the reasons are wealth inequality and buying power. If I can barely afford to buy a house now with a great job, I shudder to think what my kids would be faced with.

China is the future. Your kids would have no chance. It's the correct choice to forfeit now.

Re: Millennials and Gen Z Increasingly Pessimistic About Their Lives, Survey Finds

#69

Post by ddebernardy »

rubicon33 wrote: post #38

My wife and I are not having kids. If you could sum it up into one short explanation as to why: My wife and I don't believe that the future is going to be a better place. Chief among the reasons are wealth inequality and buying power. If I can barely afford to buy a house now with a great job, I shudder to think what my kids would be faced with.

I don't think the future is going to be a better place either, but I don't buy for an instant that it's a good reason for you to not have kids, or the actual reason you don't have any. Firstly, life is pointless and meaningless without children, or as a fallback without taking care of others. And secondly, why should you, who are aware of this, be the ones ending up not reproducing, essentially mimicking the storyline behind Idiocracy on steroids?

IMHO you've other reasons to work out, and the reasons you put forward are only an excuse.

Re: Millennials and Gen Z Increasingly Pessimistic About Their Lives, Survey Finds

#70

Post by ranie93 »

xyzzyz wrote: post #26
syn0byte wrote: post #15

A single mother working as a waitress at Denny's in the 1980's had more spending power than a college educated cubicle drone in 2019; Let's talk about how is social media's fault! Twice in the last 20 years - more than any other time in US history combined - The Presidential election went to the candidate that LOST the popular vote; These generations just lack a proper understanding of civics! The beatings will conti…

A single mother working as a waitress at Denny's in the 1980's had more spending power than a college educated cubicle drone in 2019 Do you have any source to support this? Because real median personal[1] income went up almost 50% since then[2]. [1] — don't confuse it with real median household income, which didn't grow nearly as much, because of a significant rise in single-person households which pushes the median…

I'm not the OP, and they may be overstating statistics (happy to be shown otherwise). At the same time, wage stagnation is no myth:

"From 1973 to 2013, hourly compensation of a typical (production/nonsupervisory) worker rose just 9 percent while productivity increased 74 percent. This breakdown of pay growth has been especially evident in the last decade, affecting both college- and non-college-educated workers as well as blue- and white-collar workers. This means that workers have been producing far more than they receive in their paychecks and benefit packages from their employers."[0]

"The minimum wage peaked in inflation-adjusted value in 1968, when it was equal to $10.15 in 2018 dollars. [...] As of 2018, the federal minimum wage was worth 28.6 percent less than in 1968" [1]

"While the cost of a four-year degree exploded to $104,480 [from $52,892 adjusted for inflation], real median wages only went from $54,042 to $59,039 between 1989 and 2016." [2]

Heavy childcare costs [3]

"In U.S., wage growth is being wiped out entirely by inflation" [4]

[0]https://www.epi.org/publication/charting-wage-stagnation/

[1] https://www.epi.org/publication/raising-the-federal-minimum-...

[2]https://www.forbes.com/sites/camilomaldonado/2018/07/24/pric...

[3]https://data.oecd.org/benwage/net-childcare-costs.htm

[4]https://www.washingtonpost.com/business/2018/08/10/america-w...

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