It’s hard to believe in possibility when they can’t afford stability.
We used to tell kids the world was wide open. “Do what you love.” “Reach for the stars.” But that advice doesn’t land the same in a world where rent costs more than a starting salary, degrees come with crushing debt, and entire industries collapse before they even get a chance to break in. Passion might still matter—but it doesn’t pay the bills. And today’s generation knows it.
This isn’t about laziness or lack of ambition. It’s about reality. Gen Z and younger millennials are growing up in an economy that rewards hustle but offers no safety net. They’re smart, creative, driven—and burned out before they even get started. Telling them to chase their dreams feels out of touch when survival is the first priority. These twelve truths show exactly why the old advice no longer works—and what young people are really up against.
1. Entry-level jobs require five years of experience.
It’s not just a joke—it’s a structural failure. Lindsay Dodgson reports in Business Insider that many so-called entry-level jobs now require three or more years of experience, making it nearly impossible for new graduates to qualify. Internships aren’t enough anymore. Volunteering won’t cut it. And even unpaid work doesn’t always get noticed. The bar keeps rising, and those just starting out are stuck on the outside, watching. This isn’t just discouraging—it’s demoralizing. Young people aren’t failing to launch. They’re being blocked at the gate.
When every “starter” position is secretly mid-level, it sends a clear message: your time, energy, and effort aren’t worth much until you’ve already proven yourself somewhere else. But where are they supposed to get that chance? For many, the dream job is never even reachable—it’s filtered out by an algorithm.
2. College is expensive—and often irrelevant to the job market.
For decades, college was sold as the golden ticket. A degree meant better pay, better jobs, a better life. But now, tuition has ballooned, student debt is crippling, and many grads find themselves working in completely unrelated fields—if they’re working at all.
According to Kamaron McNair at CNBC, the median return on investment for a bachelor’s degree has dropped below 10% for the first time in over two decades. Worse, the fastest-growing industries often value skills over credentials—but schools haven’t kept up. So students graduate with outdated knowledge and a mountain of debt. When young people see peers succeeding through trades, self-teaching, or sheer luck, it’s hard not to question the entire system. The promise broke. And while education still matters, the traditional path to success no longer adds up.
3. Passion jobs pay the least—and burn people out the fastest.
Teaching. Writing. Art. Social work. These are the careers kids are told to pursue if they “love what they do.” But in reality, they’re some of the lowest-paying, most emotionally exhausting jobs out there. And society depends on them—without giving workers livable wages, support, or long-term security.
In social work especially, burnout and emotional exhaustion are so widespread that professionals often leave the field despite their passion for the work, writes SaraKay Smullens in The New Social Worker.
Choosing passion means sacrificing health insurance, free time, and a future—and that choice isn’t noble. It’s unsustainable. When your dream job comes with constant anxiety and a side hustle just to survive, it stops feeling like a dream. It starts feeling like a trap.
4. Hustle culture turned dreams into debt.
Side gigs. Freelancing. Monetizing hobbies. At first, it looked like freedom—working for yourself, being your own boss, turning what you love into a paycheck. But for most people, the hustle became endless. No boundaries, no benefits, no time off. Just constant pressure to keep producing, posting, promoting, and selling.
Instead of creating security, hustle culture drained people dry. It blurred the lines between passion and labor, and made burnout feel like a personal failure. Chasing your dream became a full-time job and a side gig. And when nothing takes off the way it was promised to? You’re left with debt, exhaustion, and a resume that doesn’t fit traditional work anymore. The dream didn’t die—it just got overworked into something unrecognizable.
5. Basic needs cost too much to risk everything for a dream.
Rent, groceries, insurance, transportation—these aren’t luxuries. They’re the baseline. And for a lot of young people, they’re barely manageable. The cost of living has skyrocketed, but wages haven’t caught up. So even the idea of “starting over” or taking a leap toward something meaningful feels impossible. One wrong move, and it’s eviction or debt or total collapse. This isn’t fear—it’s pragmatism. You can’t build a career you love when your paycheck barely covers survival. So people take jobs they hate.
They put their ambitions on the back burner. They stay in places that drain them because the risk of change feels bigger than the hope of something better. Chasing your goals is hard enough. Doing it without a financial cushion? That’s not inspiring. That’s dangerous.
6. Mental health challenges are making long-term plans feel out of reach.
Anxiety, depression, burnout—these aren’t rare anymore. They’re the emotional backdrop for an entire generation coming of age in crisis. Between school shootings, climate collapse, economic instability, and social isolation, young people aren’t just trying to find purpose.
They’re trying to stay afloat. And when your nervous system is constantly in survival mode, “following your passion” can feel laughably out of touch. Even those who know what they want often don’t have the mental or emotional capacity to pursue it. Therapy is expensive. Time off isn’t an option. And burnout hits before a real career even begins. When your dream depends on hustle and stability at the same time, and you have neither, the system starts to feel rigged. Mental health isn’t a personal failure—it’s a reflection of a world that’s asking too much and giving too little in return.
7. The industries kids once dreamed of are collapsing or corrupt.
Acting. Journalism. Music. Publishing. Even once-stable fields like healthcare and education. All of them are undergoing slow-motion breakdowns—underfunded, overtaken by AI, decimated by budget cuts, or hollowed out by corporate greed. And the people working in them? Overworked, underpaid, or quietly quitting. There’s not much left to aspire to when the dream job barely exists anymore.
Young people are watching this happen in real time. Their heroes are burned out. Their mentors are leaving. They’re not naive—they’re realistic. Why pour yourself into a career that’s falling apart from the inside? It’s not a lack of ambition. It’s a lack of trust in a system that promises fulfillment and delivers exhaustion. When entire fields are shrinking or imploding, dreams don’t feel inspiring. They feel unsafe.
8. Financial independence is harder to achieve than ever before.
For previous generations, getting your first job meant moving out, building credit, and starting a life. Now? Many young adults stay with family out of necessity, not laziness.
Rent is too high, down payments are out of reach, and saving money feels impossible when everything costs more—especially if you’re carrying student debt or medical bills. And without financial freedom, risk becomes unaffordable. Chasing your goals used to be about courage. Now it requires capital. The ability to pivot, start a business, relocate, or even just take an unpaid internship depends on having a financial safety net—and most young people don’t.
They’re not unmotivated. They’re stuck. Until basic financial stability is within reach, “follow your heart” will always sound like a luxury disguised as advice.
9. The path to success is no longer clear—or even linear.
It used to go: school, degree, job, promotion, house. But now? That path is fractured. Careers are patchworks of side gigs, contract work, remote shifts, layoffs, and reinventions. And no one’s offering a roadmap. Instead, young people are told to build the plane while flying it—without tools, guidance, or a safety net. It’s not ambition they’re lacking. It’s direction that actually makes sense.
This uncertainty doesn’t breed innovation—it breeds exhaustion. When every step forward feels improvised, it’s hard to imagine a future, let alone plan one. And with industries constantly shifting, the goalposts keep moving. What worked yesterday might be obsolete tomorrow. In that kind of chaos, telling someone to chase a dream feels more like a dare than encouragement. It assumes stability that just doesn’t exist anymore.
10. Work culture no longer promises loyalty or reward.
The message used to be clear: work hard, stay loyal, and you’ll be rewarded. Promotions, raises, pensions, stability. But those promises crumbled years ago. Now, companies lay off workers over Zoom, gut departments for profits, and ghost candidates after ten interviews. Loyalty isn’t rewarded—it’s exploited. And young people know it.
Why invest years into a dream job when the company might fold, automate, or outsource your position next quarter? Why grind for a raise that doesn’t match inflation? The social contract between worker and employer is broken, and ambition can’t fix that. So younger generations are opting out. They’re taking freelance gigs, changing careers often, or choosing flexibility over blind loyalty. They’re not flaky—they’re realistic. If there’s no reward for commitment, following your passion becomes just another risk with no return.
11. Survival has replaced self-actualization for an entire generation.
It’s hard to self-actualize when you’re juggling three jobs, skipping doctor’s appointments, and wondering if your credit score will tank from one emergency. Maslow’s hierarchy doesn’t lie—when your basic needs aren’t met, personal growth takes a backseat. For many young people, survival isn’t just a phase. It’s their entire twenties. Maybe longer. That doesn’t mean they don’t care about meaning or purpose.
It means those things aren’t accessible until life feels a little less precarious. And pretending otherwise is cruel. You can’t manifest a dream when you’re living paycheck to paycheck. You can’t build your best life when you’re one accident away from total collapse. The foundation is missing. And until that changes, ambition will always be filtered through fear.
12. Telling kids to “just follow their passion” ignores everything stacked against them.
It’s not bad advice in theory. Wanting kids to pursue joy, purpose, and creativity is noble. But in practice, it ignores the world they’re growing up in. It assumes equal access, stable footing, and endless resilience. And that’s not what they’ve been given. They’ve been handed a broken economy, a dying planet, and a mental health crisis—and told to chase a feeling.
This kind of advice isn’t empowering anymore. It’s dismissive. It sidesteps the structural issues and puts the pressure on individuals to “figure it out.” But young people don’t need more pressure. They need housing. Healthcare. Opportunity. Safety. Until then, telling them to follow their dreams isn’t just unrealistic—it’s a failure to meet them where they are. And they deserve better than that.