Lazy. Entitled. Self-absorbed. Too demanding. Unwilling to work.
If you’ve spent any time listening to the prevailing narrative about Gen Z, you’ve heard those words. But these insults aren’t new; they are part of a recurring cycle of generational hazing.
Critics called Baby Boomers the “Me Generation.” Gen X was the “Slacker Generation.” Millennials were dismissed as entitled and fragile. The labels change, but the story stays the same: the “kids” are always the problem.
Maybe that should make us question whether the problem is really generational at all.
I recently participated in the YouTube series Surrounded, from Jubilee, which puts people with opposing views in a room to debate questions often reduced to viral political talking points. There is no script, just the raw friction of different worlds colliding.
I came in ready to argue that Gen Z faces problems unique to our generation. We entered adulthood through a pandemic, into a housing crisis, with the cost of education and health care rising faster than people’s ability to keep up.
Those problems are real, and I came into Surrounded assuming the generational divide would explain how we got saddled with them. That wasn’t the case.
The episode is titled “One Gen Z Member of Congress vs. 20 Boomers.” Clickbait? Absolutely. It’s YouTube.
The Boomers came to fight. And we disagreed plenty. But the longer we talked, the harder it became to argue that an entire generation of older Americans was responsible for the economic problems facing mine.
The more consequential divide wasn’t between the people sitting and the person standing in front of them. It was between the people with the power to shape the economy and the rest of us who have to live in it.
Since 1978 — when Boomers were the age Gen Z is now — the share of America’s wealth held by the wealthiest 0.1 percent has grown from about seven percent to roughly 18 percent, and the top one percent’s share of national income has nearly doubled, from about 10 percent to 19 percent. The top one percent now control roughly 31 percent of America’s wealth, while the bottom 50 percent hold 2.5 percent. When wealth becomes this concentrated, so does the ability to influence elections, shape policy, set the rules of our economy and dominate public debate.
Generations don’t set interest rates. They don’t write tax policy, determine wages, decide how much corporations can charge for health care or set the price of a college degree. Institutions and people with power make those decisions, and everyone else feels the consequences.
Take housing. Gen Z is coming of age during a historic housing crisis. In 1978, the median home sold for about $55,000, compared with a median household income ofroughly $15,000. Today, a median home costs about $424,000, while median income is around $84,000. Home prices have increased almost eightfold while incomes have gone up about five and a half times. Today’s median first-time homebuyer is 40 years old, up from 29 in 1981, the first year the National Association of Realtors tracked it.
The problem isn’t that millions of Boomers bought homes. It’s that the housing-market rules have made homeownership increasingly unattainable for everyone coming after them. That’s not a generational personality problem. It’s an economic one.
The same pattern shows up in higher education.
Gen Z was told to go to college, get a degree and build a career. We followed that advice.
In 1978, a year of tuition and fees at a public four-year college averaged about $688, roughly $3,300 in today’s dollars. Today, the average is more than $11,600 for an in-state student.
For previous generations, college was a way to get ahead. For many in Gen Z, it’s simply the price of entry.
I didn’t finish college, and I don’t have student debt, so I understand the fairness argument around loan forgiveness. But I also recognize the unfairness of telling an entire generation they need a degree to compete, charging more than ever for it, and leaving them with the debt. All of this debt is holding back the entire country. For too many young Americans, the promise of college has become a financial burden instead of a path to stability.
We didn’t suddenly become unwilling to work. The price of following the traditional path to stability exploded. For a generation often called lazy, more than half of Gen Z workers are picking up gigs, side hustles, and second jobs to cover rent and pay for food.
From here on, let’s dismiss the false idea that Gen Z doesn’t want to work. Let’s all try to figure out why the long hours previous generations put in, and the hard work we’re putting in now, haven’t led to more prosperity.
Generational blame is a distraction.
We’ve turned frustration with an unfair economy into a generational fight. Young Americans are told Boomers took their opportunities, while older Americans are told young people simply don’t want to work. Both arguments miss the bigger question: Who built an economy that funnels more wealth to billionaires and corporations while telling everyone else that their struggles are their own fault?
We’re fighting each other over who had it harder while billionaires profit from our division and continue accumulating wealth at everyone else’s expense.
The problem isn’t that one generation ruined America for another. The problem is that our nation’s wealth and power have been concentrated in too few hands.
Every generation has inherited the same basic hope: If you work hard, build a life, and raise a family, you can give your children or the next generation the opportunity to do even better.
My generation is questioning that promise.
And that was the most surprising lesson from my discussion on Surrounded. The cameras were pointed at a generational divide. But once we actually started talking, the labels became less important. The people I debated were parents and grandparents, workers and retirees, people who had succeeded and people who had struggled. At one point, when the cameras stopped rolling, the producers asked one of the debaters why she wasn’t running to challenge me.
Her answer was simple: Because I agree with him.
This made me realize disagreement over the solution doesn’t mean disagreement over the problem. Democracy requires us to argue about solutions. But the question isn’t whether Boomers or Gen Z had it harder. It’s whether ordinary Americans — Americans across all generations — still have enough power to shape the country they live in. Because while we’re busy blaming each other, the people with the most wealth and power are writing the tax code, zoning rules, and the terms of your lease.
I’m not asking anyone to stop arguing. Democracy is an argument. I’m asking for something harder. Find the person you’ve been told is the reason your life is expensive, and talk to them. Not online. In a room, the way we did. You’ll disagree. You should. But somewhere in that conversation you’ll find you’re angry about the same thing, and that is the moment this stops being a generational fight and starts being a coalition.
That’s what the people counting on our division are actually afraid of.
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