OnlyFans and AI training: why gen Z doesn’t care where our money comes from | Alice Lassman
With traditional goals such as stability and homeownership feeling out of reach, young people are focused on the present By now, we all know the shape of financial nihilism: the throw-your-money-at-anything reaction to the dissolution of the slow, linear path to wealth; the prediction markets , meme stocks , cryptocurrencies and microluxuries growing in its place. We’re left in an economic no…
In an era where traditional paths to wealth seem elusive, young people are increasingly preoccupied with the present. Financial nihilism, characterized by a throw-your-money-at-anything reaction, has replaced the slow, linear route to wealth. Instead, prediction markets, meme stocks, cryptocurrencies, and microluxuries have taken its place.
This economic no man's land raises the question of how young people earn their money. Historically, the modern economy has relied on stable employment to generate the work ethic that keeps the production wheel turning. However, this is proving challenging for the younger generation. Their jobs are precarious, housing is unaffordable, and the idea of having children at all is a deferral.
Only 6% of Gen Z respondents see a leadership position as their primary career goal. Hope, a key driver of productivity, has been diminished, weakening their commitment to long hours. The breakdown of the income production function, the mechanism that transforms hard work into a stable salary, a mortgage, and a pension, has led to a growing indifference among my generation to the nature of work we're willing to participate in and where we're willing to earn. This phenomenon is what I term as production nihilism.
Written by urgent.news from The Guardian US's reporting — not their text. Machine-written — may contain errors; check the original before relying on it.
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