5 Reasons Millennials Are Stressed
10 minute read.
Millennials are stressed.
We talk about it a lot. Some of us understand why we are stressed, but not all of us do. We may think it’s normal to be this stressed, or that stress is part of a successful and productive life. Whatever we believe, we can agree that this long term stress is taking its toll on our health, our relationships, our leisure time, and our professions.
Did Baby Boomers experience the same stress as millennials?
Honestly, no. At least not white, middle class baby boomers.
Conditions in our institutions and workplaces have worsened. Our wages are stagnant, not nearly keeping up with the rate of inflation, and we hold more debt than any other generation while housing, food, education, gasoline and healthcare costs skyrocket above inflation.
Millennials deserve love.
Millennials get a bad rep. We are vilified in the press, stereotyped in media and put down by older generations. We have it hard.
We are also the most diverse, empathetic, kind, liberation oriented generation yet. We think and feel and care about the future.
For the above reasons, we need to learn how to take care of ourselves. The first step in making a change is understanding why the struggle exists. Understanding why we are so stressed.
I am writing this post in April of 2022. The student loan pause has been extended again, and my partner of 9 years and I are re-starting the search for our first home, again. It is a reminder to me that millennials have not had it easy, and we must cherish every break that is given to us.
Please pace yourself while reading this. Take small bites. Read the ending, and let yourself feel the feelings that come up.
1. Economy and student loan debt.
As of 2021, 38% of millennials, or 14.8 million millennials, were paying off student loan debt. The average borrower currently owes $38,877. In 2020, the average salary of millennials was $71,560.
While other generations also carry significant student loan debt, college has simply cost more for millennials. Obviously we can expect tuition rates to increase, but most of these rates have surpassed inflation, meaning that going to college is more expensive than ever, even in today’s money.
Believe it or not, on average, millennials are high earners (not including social services or education positions, which are mostly jobs held by women, black, indigenous and other people of color).
But due to the extremely high cost of living, experiencing two recessions, and student loans, we are struggling to retain wealth.
At 79.8 million in 2016, millennials were the most populous generation, but least likely to own their own home. That same year, 5.3 million of the 17 million households living in poverty were millennials.
Despite these facts, economic crises, being a generation of renters, inflation and student loan debt, millennials are vilified in the media as *lazy, frivolous in their “spending” and selfish.
*I take a lot of issue with the word lazy, and it makes me smile that many millennials are reclaiming the word as more positive than pejorative.
2. “What jobs require you to go to college?“
Here’s another question: Why is college required for jobs? The phenomenon of 'degree inflation’ is the “rising demand for bachelor’s degrees in jobs that didn’t always require one, and probably don’t actually require one now.”
In 2015, 67% of production supervisor job postings asked for a college degree, while only 16% of employed production supervisors had one.”
In other words, the people currently doing the work don’t have degrees, but as they retire or leave their positions, their replacements will be expected to. The end result is that companies struggle to fill jobs, incurring unnecessary costs, all the while leaving experienced, willing workers without opportunity.
This is a legal form of class oppression. Those that have the skills to work a job, but are denied due to their status as non-college graduates are being oppressed. College is expensive, and despite everyone having the right to take out loans, many do not want to, or they are unable to leave their homes due to other responsibilities (caregiving, parenting, primary income earner, etc.)
Also, not everyone wants to go to college, and there is absolutely nothing wrong with that. Giving young people the idea that college is their only option after finishing high school is limiting and unfair.
Like many others, if I could go back and take a different path at age 18, I probably would. I would go to community college instead of an expensive private university that I struggled in because I didn’t know how to study. Or I would move to another city and be on my own, gaining skills and meeting new and interesting people. (Thankfully, the path I chose led me to a life I love and a partner that is the best person I have ever known. I have been lucky.
3. Buy Things + Hit Milestones = Be Happy.
Consumerism is “a social and economic order that encourages the acquisition of goods and services in ever-increasing amounts.” It is the most dangerous tool used by capitalism.
As the industrial revolution progressed, production of goods transitioned into overproduction. Corporations, companies, businesses, etc. then began producing at a rate that would increase their wealth and profit, rather than by what public need was. Inventions and tools that were created to make life “easier” kept being produced despite lack of demand.
These days, many Americans experience high levels of stress due to products and apps that take up their time and attention. This birthed phrases like “analysis paralysis” and “decision fatigue”, terms coined in 21st century consumerism. This not only causes stress, but it eats out time. We are fed the message that our stress is a product of not having enough. When we buy (or “consume”) and we are still unhappy, our stress worsens. What is the answer?
Thankfully, millennials are choosing experience over possessions more and more everyday. As a diverse, *educated, tolerant group, many millennials are choosing to live smarter and more sustainably.
(*Being educated doesn’t make you a morally superior human being than someone with less education, and to assume so is classist. However, increased education provides you with opportunities to be exposed to people, ideas and places that are different from your own.)
This does not mean that millennials do not feel pressure to own possessions that elevate their status in society, or to meet particular milestones (marriage, children, home ownership) at similar times compared with older generations.
Millennials are also often the children of baby boomers that hold “bootstrap“ mentalities, or the belief that everything that happens to you is solely your responsibility and that hard work and determination will always result in happiness and solved problems. This is a laughably supremacist point of view. It may have been true 40 years ago for able bodied white men above the poverty line, but that’s about it.
4. Climate Change.
We know that it’s real, we know that choices made by humans are the primary cause, we know we are already feeling the effects of it, and we know that ways to slow it are not being prioritized.
Our world has been warming since the 1950’s. We are seeing longer, hotter heat waves; increased precipitation; stronger, more dangerous storm systems; rising sea levels; destruction of ecosystems and plenty of valid concern for the state the world in our elder years.
This brings about anxiety and distress for millennials who are beginning to make their mark on the world, have children, or simply care for the planet.
Studies show that millennials and Gen-Z show up more than any other generation in talks about climate change. We are demanding and desperately pleading for change.
5. White Supremacy in Workplace Culture.
As discussed before, white supremacy is not only the tool of Nazis and the KKK, and to assume so is dangerous. White supremacy culture exists in our jobs, our interactions with others and our institutions. Included in Dismantling Racism: A Workbook for Social Change Groups by Kenneth Jones and Tema Okum in 2001, white supremacy culture can be defined by the following characteristics:
Perfectionism or little appreciation expressed for the work that others are doing, mostly criticisms.
Sense of Urgency or rushing what could be thoughtful decision making, results in harm.
Defensiveness or criticism of those in power is viewed as threatening instead of feedback.
Quantity Over Quality or all resources going towards producing measurable goals.
Worship of the Written Word or “if it’s not in a memo, it doesn’t exist”, other exchanges of information are not valued.
Paternalism or decision making is clear to those in power but not those without power.
Either/Or Thinking or labels of good/bad, right/wrong, with us/against us.
Power Hoarding or little or no value in sharing power, those in power have “the best interests” for the organization and those wanting change are stupid.
Fear of Open Conflict or those in power running from conflict, blame is placed on those bringing up any issue that could be changed.
Individualism or accountability goes up or down, not sideways, little ability to work with a team, lack of accountability.
Progress is Bigger, More or progress comes with growth not improvement of goods/services.
Objectivity or belief that emotions are destructive and should not play a role in decision making and that objectivity is possible.
Right to Comfort or belief that those in power have a right to emotional and psychological comfort, scapegoating those who cause discomfort.
Do you recognize any of these in your own workplace? Characteristics like those described above in a job can cultivate fear, isolation and internalized stigma in its workers. Every single therapy job I have worked before now has been built in White Supremacy Culture.
That is why I choose to coach therapists who have been exploited by bosses, managers and supervisors. It is also why the treatment I offer clients is politically informed and liberation oriented.
I am a firm believer of allowing myself time to sit with my feelings. Letting my heart break over the pain that myself and others in my generation have had to endure. I am also a practitioner of sustainable living, mindfulness and loving kindness, which is why the next post you see from TWS is entitled, How to Manage Stress As Millennials.
Until then, I urge you to feel your feelings. Millennials have been told to sit down, be quiet and accept unfair conditions for years. The only way to overcome pain is to address it, so let your heart break, cry for what you’ve lost, and grieve. Journal for mental health, take care of yourself by setting work/life boundaries, talk with your loved ones.
Please remember that there is always space to take up, happiness and joy to pursue and relief to gain. I am with you, we are in this together.
Thank you for reading!
Email contact@teletherapywithsarah.com with questions/comments/concerns.
I provide therapy to professional millennials from working class backgrounds. I coach “Exploited Therapists” or therapists who have been exploited by managers, bosses and supervisors. I help them build their dream private practices.
Teletherapy in all corners of Pennsylvania from Philadelphia to Scranton to Erie to Pittsburgh.
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Ready to get started? Click here, or reach out to contact@teletherapywithsarah.com for a free 20 minute consultation.
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Very Best,
—Sarah (she/her)
*Disclaimer - This piece was written by a straight, cis, able-bodied, white woman. Intersectionality (coined by lawyer, civil rights advocate, scholar and philosopher Kimberlé Crenshaw) tells us that race, ethnicity, class, sexuality, gender, etc. that differ from the above identifiers encounter hardship and oppression at a much higher rate.*
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