Looking at polling about the attitudes of young citizens is to realize we're sailing into a different world. And there is reason to hope that world is a better, more benign, democratic (small "d") place. Really.
Item: John Della Volpe studies young Americans.
For more than two decades, I’ve been embedded in the land of young Americans. First millennials, and now Gen Z with an eye on Gen Alpha. From my perch since 2000 as polling director at Harvard Kennedy School’s Institute of Politics, at SocialSphere, and as the dad of a few Zoomers and one Zillennial — I spend most of my time talking with, surveying, and thinking about young Americans.
He sees a pattern I find fascinating:
Gen Z is in the midst of the best job market in their lifetime — and also most of the lifetimes of their parents and grandparents. The youth (16-24) unemployment rate is 7.5% — the lowest at any point since the Eisenhower administration. Among Gen Zers between 20 and 24 years old, the unemployment rate is 6%; it is only 5.3% among young women.
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Gen Z seeks unconventional, self-directed work environments
Currently, over half of Zoomers between 15 and 25 are working part-time or full-time jobs (52%) – with nearly a quarter (23%) working more than one job. Living up to their own standards, nearly two-thirds (62%) have found roles that leave them fulfilled.
Very few Zoomers that we interacted with over the last year showed an interest in the jobs that their parents once or currently hold. Gen Z is witnessing the regrets of their parents playing out in near real-time, sacrificing family time and personal fulfillment for a work culture where the rewards are reaped by only a few.
Only about one-in-ten Zoomers aspire to a “conventional work environment,” we found that far more find conditions with “social” (21%) or “self-directed” and “unconventional” (20%) elements appealing.
I read this and I am reminded of my own early Boomer cohort which came of age in the late 1960s. We had NO interest in joining the conformist work culture of many of our parents who had happily traded the struggles of the Depression and WWII for calm and consumption. We aspired to make something better, more meaningful -- and in the context of general prosperity, we did change the country -- and did make life somewhat freer for communities of color, women and queers. Sure we had many failings, but the culture never reverted and the MAGAs are still pissed off about it.
Wonder what the Zoomers will do?
Item: This is less general, but something very interesting is happening in California voter registrations. Demographic change -- becoming a "majority/minority" state where no ethnicity amounts to over 50 percent -- facilitated the state turning heavily Democratic (capital "D") around 2000.
This shift did not include newly engaged voters enthusiastically signing up as Dems. In fact, the fraction that chose "independent" has grown ever since. The traditional political party divisions did not appeal.
But, unexpectedly to me, the increase in independent registrations seems to have peaked or even declined among young people, according to the LA Times.
Voter registration data in many states also has shown an increase in independents, although there’s intriguing data from California suggesting that trend may have started to turn around.
After decades of steady increase, the share of Californians registering as nonpartisan peaked in 2018 at 28%. It has dropped since by 5 points, with the biggest declines coming among young voters. Among voters younger than 35, the share registered as nonpartisan is the lowest it’s been since 2006, according to analysis by Eric McGhee of the Public Policy Institute of California.
... Party polarization has been strong for years, but since the Trump era, “it’s entered into a whole other gear,” [McGhee] said. “I wonder if that hasn’t changed how people think about the parties” and made the option of sitting outside the party system feel less attractive.
I'm not such an unfaltering Democrat that I'm jumping for joy about this -- but I've long accepted that, if you want to play, you have to get in the game. New registrants, mostly young, seem to be coming to play.
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