According to this chart, I’ve only ever been boomer successful, but for 15 years, my boss has been a very handsome dumb idiot, my ice cream shop is 10 years old this month, and I’ve got two lovely kids who are mean to me. Feels like a success to me.
Advertise here with Carbon Ads
This site is made possible by member support. ❤️
Big thanks to Arcustech for hosting the site and offering amazing tech support.
When you buy through links on kottke.org, I may earn an affiliate commission. Thanks for supporting the site!
kottke.org. home of fine hypertext products since 1998.
Comments 6
thread
latest
popular
That's wild. But also, Gen Z ends in 2012, so some of these respondents are like 12 years old.
If you read the fine print of the survey, they surveyed people who 18 and older.
That’s a crazy difference. At the risk of sounding condescending is there any chance older people are just used to 100k being the standard? Inflation is hard
Still... I wouldn't take the Gen Z number very seriously. These are, for the most part, people without fully developed pre-frontal cortexes, and with almost no life/work experience.
I wonder if the Boomers are just out of date on salaries/cost of living (given that in the 80s/early90s, 100k really would have put you in the upper middle class), or if the newer generations sense of what 'financial success' means has been skewed by the growth (and growth in prominence) of the super rich. Ie. Is this about perceptions or reality or perceptions of reality.
I remember getting out of college (engineering, 20 years ago) and dreaming that some day I may hit 6 figures. My number has evolved quite a bit since then as my actual salary has increased but I do still remind myself when I'm angling for raises or annoyed about salary that I should remember to be at least a little grateful since there was a time when I dreamed about someday earning 100k.
Hello! In order to comment or fave, you need to be a current kottke.org member. If you'd like to sign up for a membership to support the site and join the conversation, you can explore your options here.
Existing members can sign in here. If you're a former member, you can renew your membership.
Note: If you are a member and tried to log in, it didn't work, and now you're stuck in a neverending login loop of death, try disabling any ad blockers or extensions that you have installed on your browser...sometimes they can interfere with the Memberful links. Still having trouble? Email me!
In order to comment or fave, you need to be a current kottke.org member. Check out your options for renewal.
This is the name that'll be displayed next to comments you make on kottke.org; your email will not be displayed publicly. I'd encourage you to use your real name (or at least your first name and last initial) but you can also pick something that you go by when you participate in communities online. Choose something durable and reasonably unique (not "Me" or "anon"). Please don't change this often. No impersonation.
Note: I'm letting folks change their display names because the membership service that kottke.org uses collects full names and I thought some people might not want their names displayed publicly here. If it gets abused, I might disable this feature.
If you feel like this comment goes against the grain of the community guidelines or is otherwise inappropriate, please let me know and I will take a look at it.
Hello! In order to leave a comment, you need to be a current kottke.org member. If you'd like to sign up for a membership to support the site and join the conversation, you can explore your options here.
Existing members can sign in here. If you're a former member, you can renew your membership.
Note: If you are a member and tried to log in, it didn't work, and now you're stuck in a neverending login loop of death, try disabling any ad blockers or extensions that you have installed on your browser...sometimes they can interfere with the Memberful links. Still having trouble? Email me!