As Gen Z overtakes boomers in the workforce, a look at the changing perspectives on jobs

This year, members of Generation Z, those born after 1997, are expected to outnumber baby boomers in the workforce for the first time. They bring with them, like past generations, different expectations, attitudes toward upper management and views on the importance of work in their daily lives. We hear from some of those workers and Stephanie Sy reports on the generational differences.
Amna Nawaz:
This year, for the first time, members of Generation Z, those born after 1997, are expected to outnumber Baby Boomers in the work force.
They bring with them, like past generations, different expectations, attitudes towards upper management and views on the importance of work in their daily lives.
Stephanie Sy has more in a moment.
But, first, let’s hear from workers in those different generations.
Chris Hicks, Millennial:
I’m Chris Hicks, a 29-year-old Millennial engineer from Cleveland, Ohio.
Ingrid Kamphaus, Generation X:
My name is Ingrid Kamphaus. I am Generation X. I am based in Springfield, Illinois. I work in state government, and I am a learning and development manager.
Gabriel Casul, Generation Z:
My name is Gabriel Casul. I’m a retail sales associate and part of Gen Z.
Lucinda Manley, Baby Boomer:
My name is Lucinda Manley. I work in Florida in the insurance industry and have for over 40 years, and I am the Boomer generation.
Ingrid Kamphaus:
I would say, for a good portion of my career, I did make work my identity. I am not proud of that. It would be to the point where I was working every evening, all the time on the weekends.
There were many times where my partner would take the laptop out of my hands as we were in bed.
(Laughter)
Chris Hicks:
I had to force myself to work within certain hours and then turn off my phone afterwards, right, just so that way I can maintain some sort of peace for myself and protect my relationships and hobbies.
Lucinda Manley:
I was working for a company that we had high-demand customers. My daughter at the time was going to take her driver’s test. In the middle of all of this, I was doing a certificate of insurance, and I remember her telling me: “Mom, can you stop working? I’m learning to drive. I’m taking my test. Can you focus on me for a change?”
That was sort of an epiphany for me to know that it was getting to be too much. The strong work ethic was actually ruling not just my life, but the life of my family.
Gabriel Casul:
Gen Z is finally taking the stance on demanding what boundaries can be set, what rules should be followed. We’re being asked to take on jobs of three to four different people, meet those expectations and then exceed expectations, all while being paid to bare minimum.
Quite frankly, me and my generation, we don’t see that as a substantial way of living. People like to tout that they work 60, 70 hours a week, but we ask the question, what — is that life? Is that really living?
Lucinda Manley:
For me, there’s never really been a reward for all the hard work. Don’t get me wrong, I have a great job, but it never really came with the rewards that I thought, especially monetary rewards.
Chris Hicks:
Work supports my relationships. It supports my ability to go out and have lunch with my friends and visit family. So I have worked to live because those things are more important. This — work is the foundation and it feeds all the things that I need or that I really prioritize.
Ingrid Kamphaus:
What I wish I would have known starting my career is that my value as a person is not coupled to the work that I’m doing. Really, what did it was onboarding the younger generation and really buying into the Millennials, where it’s like, hey, 5:00, I’m done, no weekends and all that.
So I’m really taking a cue from that generation.
Gabriel Casul:
Older generations will constantly say that we are lazy, we don’t want to work, we just want handouts, when, in reality, we want things to be fair, we want things to be acceptable when it comes to pay, for example.
The cost of living has gone up and companies are making record profits and we’re just not seeing that down at the bottom.
Stephanie Sy:
For more, I’m joined by Kyla Scanlon, a writer and content creator that focuses on economics.
Kyla, thanks so much for joining the “News Hour.”
You heard from that last comment that we just played from Gabriel, the Gen Z’er, a lot of the things that you talk about on social media, which is the idea that Gen Z’ers feel they can no longer achieve the American dream by working. Is that the reason why a lot of Gen Z’ers have simply decided to forego work?
Kyla Scanlon, Writer and Video Creator: Yes, I mean, I think Gen Z has had a tough go of it, being essentially born into the tech bubble, growing up during the Great Recession and then graduating or being in college during the pandemic.
It’s all quite difficult. And I think the relationship between the employer and the employee has deteriorated significantly over the past 25 years or so. And so a lot of Gen Z’ers look at the traditional 9:00-to-5:00 structure and they’re like, that doesn’t necessarily offer me what it maybe offered my parents or grandparents.
So they seek out flexible work arrangements. They seek out maybe consulting or different types of freelancing work versus going after a more traditional corporate structure.
Stephanie Sy:
You talk a lot about housing affordability as being part of that American dream.
There has been some data in the past year that shows younger workers within Gen Z have actually seen about an 8 percent rise in wage growth. That’s more than the overall population. Why isn’t wage growth enough to offset those financial burdens that seem so keenly felt by Gen Z’ers?
Kyla Scanlon:
Yes, I mean, I think housing definitely impacts pretty much everybody, not just Gen Z.
But I think for a lot of Gen Z’ers, rent is definitely not as affordable as it used to be. Real wages have increased, so wages adjusted for inflation, but rent has increased much more. And that’s sort of the foundation of how everyone experiences the economy. It’s where you live and how you have to pay for where you live.
And so I think people look at the price of rent, they look at the price of gas, they look at the price of food, they just look at the inflation that we have experienced over the past few years, and it’s sometimes just not enough to even make those real wage gains worth it.
Stephanie Sy:
It goes back to a term that I believe you coined, which is vibecession, the feeling that there’s a vibe that we’re in a recession, even though the economy is not in that place.
You attribute that to housing. What are the vibes now, especially as we head into an election?
Kyla Scanlon:
Yes, so the vibecession is that disconnect between consumer sentiment and economic data.
And a lot of it is structural affordability like housing. It’s also the cost of childcare, eldercare, these things that are economically quite painful, but don’t necessarily show up in traditional economic measurements like GDP, et cetera.
They’re things that are kind of these hidden costs that people experience. There’s also the media sentiment that drives a lot of how people feel about their economic circumstances. Media sentiment has trended negative for a long time, and that’s just, unfortunately, the business model in a lot of cases.
And so people are reading headlines that are quite negative, dealing with structural affordability problems, despite everyone being like, well, the economy is OK. And so there’s a bit of a disconnect there. And I think, especially for the younger generation, they get most of their news from social media, which definitely has a little bit of a clickbait phenomenon.
And I think it really does drive how people experience economic circumstances. And then, going into the election, that’s also quite difficult, because both candidates are trying to win. And so both candidates are saying things to win. And some of that can be confusing if you don’t have a proper understanding of the economy.
Stephanie Sy:
That is Kyla Scanlon, who focuses on the economy on her social media channels.
Kyla, thanks so much for joining us with your insights.
Kyla Scanlon:
Thanks for having me.