Young people today are doing better than ever when it comes to employment and wages, so why don’t they feel like it? And why are they still relying on the Bank of Mom and Dad? That’s the question posed by a new study from Pew Research Center, with the puzzle of Gen Z being better off and still somehow struggling.
The data shows that Gen Z is doing much better than young people in the 1990s when it comes to wages, and as Gen X was largely responsible for parenting Gen Z, that means that many children are outperforming their parents. In 2023, the median pay of a person between the ages of 18 and 24, for instance, was about $20,000, compared to $15,462 in 1993, when adjusting for inflation. And those between the ages of 25 to 29 make nearly $10,000 more than the young adults of 30 years ago.
As more women enter the workforce, employment numbers for young people in the U.S. have also increased. About 70% of adults in the 25-to-29-year-old category had a full-time job in 2023, compared to 65% three decades ago, according to Pew.
Gen Z may seem like they are doing great on paper, with better pay thanks to higher levels of education and a propensity to job-hop, but still say they are struggling to keep up, while Gen Z has well-publicized mental health issues, at the same time as they are mainstreaming discourse around the importance of mental health, especially in the workplace. The Pew data suggest that there’s a simple economic aspect to this: While wages are higher, many young people are hindered by higher costs that did not affect previous generations as drastically—and it’s directly affecting when they attain certain life milestones. Simply put, it’s depressing for Gen Z not to be able to afford the trappings of normal life as their parents did.
In debt for longer, getting married later
Just under half of adults in their mid-to-late twenties had outstanding student loans in 2023 compared to just under a third in 1993. The median amount owed has also jumped from four digits to five as the cost of college has become increasingly unaffordable for some. Still, college enrollment rose last year for the first time in a decade.
Over the past couple of years, the Fed’s interest rate hikes have helped put Gen Z on the real estate sidelines, but so have rising prices. And those young adults who do buy a home are straddled with higher mortgage debt than previous generations—although a recent Redfin study has pointed out that Gen Z is working hard to counter this, with a surprisingly high homeownership rate compared to previous generations, even baby boomers.
Adjusted for inflation, an 18-to 24-year-old in 2022 had a median mortgage debt of $117,000, compared to $39,367 for those in the same category in 1992, according to Pew. The same trend applies to those between the ages of 25 and 29, who had a median adjusted mortgage debt about $60,000 higher than their counterparts in the 1990s.
Consequently, many young adults have delayed major life events that used to define adulthood, such as moving out of a parents home and getting married. The study revealed that 57% of adults in the 18 to 24 range lived with parents, compared to 53% in 1993. The pattern holds true for slightly older adults in their 20s as well.
The median age for getting married and having kids has also increased, in line with the trend from other developed nations. While in 1993 half of adults in their mid-to-late twenties were married, less than a third were as of last year, and even fewer had kids.
If you are a young person who feels weighed down by increased costs for housing and education and has struggled to get ahead, Fortune wants to hear your story. Contact marco.quiroz-gutierrez@fortune.com and tell us more.
