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Why are marketing types so interested in the spending habits of the young? Generally speaking, older people have more money. However, it’s when people first have money of their own, passing through the various transitions to mature adulthood, that they form their spending habits.
When it comes to what the Millennial generation are doing with their cash, there’s a lot more than bland commercial interest going on. Indeed, there’s a touchiness to the whole subject – indeed, implications of economic, cultural and political disruption.
This stems from the likelihood that many, if not most, Millennials will be poorer than their parents and already are poorer than their parents were at the same stage in life. It’s an unsettling development for a culture that had taken it for granted that each new generation would be richer than the last.
Another great driver of change is technology – if economic insecurity provides the reason for a radical shift in consumption patterns, then digital goods, services and markets provide the means. Many sectors have been disrupted already, not least the media businesses who publish anguished articles about what young people will and won’t pay for.
With so much at stake – and such obvious tension between the generations – it’s not surprising that silly stories, like the one about Millennials not saving because they spend too much on avocado toast, blow up into major controversies.
But when not being accused of extravagance, Millennials face charges of miserliness – indeed of opting out of previously normal features of adulthood such as buying a house, starting a family and even sex. If the first duty of the capitalist citizen is to consume and produce new consumers, then Millennials are going AWOL.
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