What happens when a generation is raised with economic promises that never materialize? Gen Z might want to ask their older brothers, the Millennials, how that happened, as the Great Recession of 2008 — and the “jobless recovery” that followed — left behind millions of altered lives, if not shattered dreams.
But as the oldest Gen Zers approach the 30-year milestone, the economic habits of a generation born during a financial regime change look increasingly different from those of the generation that lived through it.
Zoomers double as so-called “market spenders,” paying hundreds of dollars for concert tickets or international travel, rooting the “YOLO economy” that emerged in 2021 amid the meme stock craze. Gen Zers have an average of $94,101 in personal debt, the most of any generation and well above millennials ($59,181) and Gen X ($53,255).
This could easily be written off as youthful financial mismanagement, but taken as a whole, Gen Z’s perspective on the economy is both a rejection of conventional wisdom and a deep, almost subconscious absorption of the commercialization of everything. Economist and author Alice Lassman, herself a Generation Zer (British), wrote for Business Insider about her personal disillusionment after her time at Columbia led to a verbal offer, later rescinded, to become an economist at USAID. She calls Gen Z’s approach to economic life “disillusionment,” or a way of coping with an uncertain and mysterious financial future.
Lassman wrote about her theory for Tutor in October 2025 and told Fortune that she came up with the term herself. “I actually sat around for a while trying to understand this broad trend or this broad glue that tied together a lot of the disparate Gen Z trends that I was seeing.” She said she believes a lot of how people relate to her generation has to do with this underlying economic phenomenon.
Gen Z’s rejection of traditional financial prudence runs deeper than coming of age during an economic downturn, like their millennial counterparts, she said. wealth in an interview. With some members still in middle school, they are much younger than millennials were in 2008 and more skeptical about their financial future, according to the Harvard Kennedy School’s Institute of Politics.
“The economic system that their parents are talking about isn’t really going to work for them the same way,” Lassman explained. Her first taste of economics was the 2008 financial crisis, which hit when she was in what the British call primary school. “It’s been kind of a perpetual crisis ever since,” she said. Gen Z has internalized a mismatch between what they’ve been told about how the economy works and what they’ve experienced much more deeply than is often appreciated, she argued.
“I think there’s this general sense of kids in school and … the content they’re exposed to, that things don’t fit, that, like the economic system that they think their parents are talking about, it’s not really going to work for them the same way,” Lassman said.
Familiar markers of stability such as property, family and retirement feel unattainable. The unemployment rate for 16- to 24-year-olds reached 10.8% last year compared to 4.3% overall. A third of Gen Z say they think they’ll never own a home, and many plan to hold off on having children. Disillusionment, to Lassman, explains why Generation Z is breaking the rules as they grow distrustful of institutions like government, media and business.
While alluding to “economic nihilism,” a term coined by entrepreneur Demetri Kofinas and made famous by Substacker influencer Kyla Scanlon, Lassman said her theory of disillusionment has to do with the “late-stage commodification of anything.” Echoing how Airbnb has pushed a model of turning a spare room into more revenue, she said “Genius Z took that logic to the limit” with their habit of “house hacking,” or renting an apartment larger than it needs, cutting it up and renting out rooms. She sees a generation that is constantly looking to diversify their sources of income and they see content creation as a kind of passive income.
“When every conventional path narrows, people start looking for alternatives. And in practice, that has meant going to the few places where a real advantage still seems possible, even if the risks are high.” Scanlon recently wrote in Wall Street Journal. “When people start treating the economy like a game, it’s a sign that the traditional ways of winning no longer feel real.”
Lassman noted that Gen Z are more likely to use buy-now, pay-later services than traditional credit cards, giving them flexibility as they grow their lives. Despite their affinity for BNPL, Gen Z appears to be, in line with Lassman’s theory, spending less overall and spending differently than older generations.
“You know, Gen Z is so interesting,” said Kelly Pedersen, PwC’s global retail leader wealthexpressing surprise at how little they spend as they get older. He estimated that Gen Z spent 10 percent to 12 percent less in the recent holiday season than the previous year. “For their spending to go down as much as they say it’s going to go down is pretty significant,” she said.
“That generation should be increasing spending more than anyone,” Pedersen said, “because it has the highest income growth of any generation,” but it’s just not happening. He added that while it was “quite surprising” to see this, any close watcher of Gen Z would expect it, as this approach to spending is “quite pervasive in that generation and some of their habits … what we’ve found in general is that the generation is very, very value-conscious.”
Pederson alluded to “dup culture,” or Gen Z’s love for cheaper alternatives to luxury goods. “We’re finding that if that generation doesn’t see the value there very quickly, they’ll very quickly switch to a dupe, right, or something that’s like what they want, but maybe not as expensive. So it’s all about value, value, value for that generation.” In other words, Gen Z’s disillusionment means that they literally see beyond the illusion of luxury fashion to the value they can get from an object. Sustainability and longevity also play a big role in how Gen Z spends their money, he added.
Gen Z also exhibits some “hostile” attitudes, Lassman said, being increasingly prone to theft in person or online because they feel justified in stealing from corporations that can absorb the loss. Others fall into zero-sum thinking about resources and an increasingly competitive job market.
They’re also more likely to experience age and money dysmorphia, Lassman said, a need to feel like they’re always touching. Short-term financial trends and coping mechanisms, such as treatment culture and high-yield dividend investments, are material and psychological “survival strategies” to manage life in an affordability crisis.
“People think they’ve lost time, so we’re all panicking about where things are going, and living in a very, very volatile world politically, socially, economically,” she said.
Economic nihilism was another strong reaction to an economy that some say does not reward long-term planning. By gambling their finances with prediction markets, sports betting and cryptocurrencies, Generation Z is creating new opportunities to build lives within the system they don’t believe serves them.
Lassman said wealth that she doesn’t think Gen Z is even aware of how they’re behaving, economically, but they’re shaping the 21st century as they grow up. “A lot of it is just kind of reactive,” she said. “And that’s how they define their own revenue streams.”
Are you a Gen Zer with first-hand experience of “disillusionment?” Contact Jacqueline.munis@fortune.com.
This story was originally featured on Fortune.com
