Millennial burnout: Work failed us
I remember the first time I felt concern over the millennial generation. Itwas 2005 when Iwas teaching a first-year writing and communication course at Virginia Tech.
My student, a conscientious and capable youngwoman, experienced anxiety to the point of not functioning while taking what I viewed as an extremely low-stakes test worth a mere 5% of the semester grade. Her test anxiety had started when taking the Virginia “Standards of Learning” exams that she had to pass to graduate high school. Even though shewas salutatorian of her class and knew the material cold, the anxiety meant she’d barely scraped over the bar on her third try. This had left a scar.
As a college instructor, I tried to help students ratchet down theirworries with perspective. I told them that long term, grades didn’t matter. I told them aboutmy own mediocre college career, and just look atme: big success!
Over the years, more and more ofmy students spoke of having their first schoolrelated anxiety attacks in middle school. Thesewere smart, hardworking people, as far from the stereotype of “coddled snowflakes” as you can imagine.
I became convinced that the problem was not a character defect in the millennial generation, but a problem with the culture in which theywere asked to operate.
With “Can’t Even: HowMillennials Became the Burnout Generation,” Anne Helen Petersen— to use a phrase popular with millennials—“brings the receipts.” “Can’t Even” is an exploration of the precarity reflected in the experiences of millions of lives in theUnited States, a precarity rooted in the fact that it is more difficult and more costly to achieve a stable, middleclass lifestyle, aswages have failed to keep up with profits, even for those with who have whatwewould consider “good jobs.”
As Petersen shows, this leads to strain and burnout. The origins are not in millennials themselves, but their largely Boomer parents who infused them with concerns over academic achievement and loaded them up with activities to make sure they stacked upwell against their peers. Boomerswere the first parenting generation to make their children the primary focus of their attention, thus triggering their own burnout and anxiety.
But the problem extends beyond parenting to the very structure ofwork and the workplace itself. Stable union jobs with goodwages that don’t require a post-secondary degree have been replaced by gig work. The endless hustle has madeweekends and actual leisure scarce.
The result? More burnout. We nowsee the pattern repeating and intensifying as millennials (the oldest of whomturn 40 next year) are parents themselves, passing their burnout along to their children.
Petersen’s interest in the subject stemmed from her own experiences. A holder of a PhD, she pivoted to a successful career as a journalist, but found herself worked to a nub with no end in sight.
The solution in Petersen’s view is to “burn it down,” to rethink and restructure society around our shared values for a good life, rather than continuing towork ourselves to a frazzle while a fortunate few get very rich. (Though even they do not escape burnout.)
Aswe’ve seen with this pandemic, this is not just a millennial story. It is everyone beyond the most fortunate. If you are feeling frustrated, wondering howyou’re going to be able to keep it together, youmay find some solace in Petersen’s book. It argues persuasively: You’re not alone, and there are things to do be done about it.