> Every single teenager is now comparing themselves against every other kid in the world instead of just their local peers
This is so out of touch. You might as well be using the "It's the video games!" excuse of yore.
Teenagers and those in their 20s see what their parents were able to do. They hear what their parents bought their house for, they know about their pensions, they see that their parents could afford raising a child into their teens, they find out that college was actually affordable. They know that's now all out of reach.
Some even see their parents struggling, and know it's going to be much much worse for them.
Huge productivity growth doesn't seem to have translated into commensurate wage growth. Meanwhile housing, higher education, and health care are increasingly unaffordable, as you note, and credentialism makes higher education a requirement for more jobs.
I think you're on target about the discouraging aspects of being visibly worse off than your parents' generation, and I think that millennials have that problem as well.
The situation is likely to get worse as AI-fueled productivity increases are unlikely to improve wages either.
This is so out of touch. You might as well be using the "It's the video games!" excuse of yore.
Teenagers and those in their 20s see what their parents were able to do. They hear what their parents bought their house for, they know about their pensions, they see that their parents could afford raising a child into their teens, they find out that college was actually affordable. They know that's now all out of reach.
Some even see their parents struggling, and know it's going to be much much worse for them.
You all really think this is about influencers?