Gen Zers’ definition of financial success includes joining the top 1% — and they’re really confident about making it

BWAHAHAHA

Social media has caused mass brain rot, and main character syndrome. This is what happens when you have a generation whose main media consumption is influencers on TikTok traveling the world. Somehow, they all think they’re doing to do better than 99% of their peers.

These little fucks are in for a rude awakening in 15 years when they’re fat and broke.

Ah, children.

Most Americans can’t even make 250K a year, let alone 587K…

Wait'll Trump repeals the ACA and these under 26ers get cut off from mommy and daddy's health insurance. Good luck paying for your STD meds, dumbasses!

Aren’t these the same people who can’t keep a job?

Reality couldn’t come quick enough for the little douchebags.

They can't even keep an entry level job. What factual basis makes them think they're all going to be billionaires?

^^^^

In their defense they are the generation who rejected Trump the most, generation X is the one who voted like they are all billionaires.

71% of Gen Z think they’re going to amass that kind of money??

I guess if you waste hours every week sitting there watching the very teeny tiny % of influencers who’ve reached that level of wealth… it can cause warped and delusional thinking.

On TikTok basically every influencer lives in a McMansion and seemingly spends half their time in the Maldives or Tulum.

That has to have some kind of effect on the people consuming that shit six hours a day.

Personal experience only, but speaking to my nieces and nephews who are all Gen Z, I think they are so engulfed in social media nonsense, that they have a skewed perspective regarding what/how much they need to survive. My oldest niece, 23, doesn’t really understand the value of money, has zero budgeting skills, and is now taking reality hard realizing how expensive being an adult is. She has been reassessing her own personal wants/needs, how much she can realistically make at a job (if she can even find one), and what she needs to do to maintain a reasonable lifestyle for herself (outside of just marrying a rich guy). It’s been a shock to her life.

What are they going to do once the the water rises?

Most of them can't make eye contact or write a proper business email.

Good luck to all of us...

r2 that's a huge part of it. They've grown up watching twats on social media and reality TV living luxurioius lifestyles while doing nothing in the way of actual work.

If I had 10 million in assets then I sure as fuck wouldn't be working. Especially a job demanding enough to pay 500k a year.

These damn kids just don't know how to be lazy

So Gen Z is between the ages of 27 and 12 right now. Even with the average age of 19 - they should have a better understanding of the world than this.

70% of them!! 7 out of 10! That means the majority of the C and D grade students.

I guarantee you - very few who graduated high school before 2000 thought they would become 1% ers and rich.

Ugh - this disgusts me so much.

Better start your OnlyFans and hooking career, kids.

How can 70% become 1% ?

This seems ridiculous, but a many Gen Z people have made a lot more money than I ever have or will from YouTube. I’m a Gen X teacher who still hasn’t gotten to $100000 a year…

R21 - define 'many' - a few thousand, sure. But it's not as many as you think. There aren't millions of high-paid influencers and YouTubers out there. There really aren't.

R20 - exactly - 70% of you expect to be upper 1%? And how exactly does the math work on that?

[quote]$180,865 a year with a net worth of $5.6 million

If they believe that you can amass a net worth of $5.6mm on an annual income of $180K, then I think I see where the delusional problem is.

Only a moron would think it's possible to amass that amount on that income in any reasonable time frame. '

After taxes, you probably have $110K. Let's assume you can save 50% of after tax or $55K. If you invest $55K a year and your investment returns 10% per year, it would take 25 years to amass that net worth - and that's assuming you invest the entire $55K at the beginning of each year, rather than assuming you've invested $4583 per month each month, thus only receving returns on an average of $27.5K.

That's all without touching any of the money for 25 years.

Sure, if you had invested $10K in Apple in 2001, you'd potentially have $2.7mm today, but that's unlikely to be what most people would have done. And, who knows what, if any, investment would be the next Apple.

They are in my thoughts and prayers.

It’s interesting that the Boomers are the most realistic, probably because they are at or near retirement age.

Gen X is incredibly unrealistic given their earnings power and savings patterns show they are falling behind.

The young of course are the most unrealistic. Social media has warped expectations. Plus they don’t seem very savvy - often judged as very difficult to manage.

Umm R25 have you seen how Gen X voted this past election?

Do you mean Gen X supporting Trump means they are unrealistic and expect to be millionaires?

Maybe that 70% will become 1% when the other 69% perish in climate change catastrophes.

In addition to inflated earning potential, younger people seem to have less and less understanding of how much life costs. It costs a lot to be a person in 2024 in just about any area I would want to live. Throw kids into the mix, and it’s even crazier. With Gen Z’s upbringing on social media wealth flaunting, it’s only going to be worse. Even that 500k household income they predict is going to evaporate faster than they think.

"70% of millennials, 53% of Gen X, and 45% of boomers..."

Everyone is fucking delusional. That's why they support Trump and his tax cuts for the wealthy...they're all convinced that's gonna be them....someday. (waves vaguely into the future...)

The youngest Boomers are turning 60 (depending on your definition of Boomer) now with the vast majority of them already over the age of 65 and well into their 70s. Yet 45% of them think they're gonna retire with $5m?

Gen X is 45 to 60 right now. They better get crackin'!!!!

R30 Re-read OP. It's $1 million for boomers, which is a very reasonable goal. Many of them are probably already there (net worth includes assets such as a house).

[quote] Gen Zers on average believe an annual salary of $587,797 and net worth of $9.47 million are needed when they envision “financial success,” according to Empower.

Good luck, losers!

And Zoomers are going to reach their goals by becoming Tik Tok stars !

R33 and Onlyfans, Instagram, YouTube.

Give them credit for loving themselves

If OP's statistics are really true, all they prove is that Gen Zs didn't pay enough attention in Math class.

The ones who are listening to the better podcasts about investing etc may have some hope, because if you invest even small amounts in high-growth assets from early on, the compounding effect can do brilliant things. And there ARE a lot of podcasts that are chatty enough for Gen Zs but still quite well informed.

However, it will be the rare Gen Z who can reliably make a large salary, because of the enormous discontinuities in the job market. You can become an X and be in a lot of demand, yet find that in 10 years X isn't even a thing any more. So even if you do make over $250K for a few years, the chances you'll be able to do it for a whole career are remote.

Cunts

It’s going to be easy to be well off, when these babies are BROKE.

If they only knew hoe many of those influencers rent slaves and are deep in debt for vacations etc. These people don't get that most social media is a lie

I have NO idea hoe slaves got in there. I meant rent spaces.

Xers were able to go through the dotcom boom and crash and learn from it. Millenials and Z didn’t experience that. That don’t realize how temporary things can be.

This is going to suck for them.

No wonder these tards voted for trump

It wasn't rage, it was unrealistic expectations.

I’m astounded people out of their teens can be so delusional. I dreamed of being rich and famous as a teenager but I never actually relied on it hsppening to me or expected it

I hate to blame everything on Reagan, but I blame Reagan. We made this really stupid, poisonous shift in the 1980s away from the old American dream, in which everyone would hopefully wind up with a decent life, to a much worse idea. We decided a decent life with a house and car wasn't nearly enough. You had to have a ridiculously rich and luxurious life or you were a failure, and of course that life would really only be available to a few people. Just mathematically, you can't give that to a majority of the population. And so the American dream fades away and is replaced by the Winner Take All society, but with lots of losers. It sucks. It's a truly shitty ideal and it's depressing to see so many generations embracing it.

The Gen ze ers I know are walking dogs for rent money. This is how they temporarily get out of their parents house.