By Yashoraj Tyagi, CTO & CBO, CASHe
The world is accelerating. Up until the early 1900s, people could expect to live lives that were not too far removed from that of their parents and grandparents. In fact, it wasn’t uncommon for all three generations across a family to bond over the same things. This started changing acutely in the post-war years as the industrial revolution matured and gave way to the seeds of the information age. As the internet went mainstream, there was a profound alteration of the human consciousness at both the social and the individual levels. It is at this intersection that the first cohort of the much-maligned ‘GenZ’ emerged.
Loosely defined as those who were born between the late 1990s and early 2010s, GenZ is the first generation to have grown up with the internet. On top of that, much of their realities are derived from an increasingly all-digital world: digital watches, pocket-sized phones, access to global television programming, etc.
Much like a modern device, GenZ is part of a generation that is subconsciously a part of a larger culture hive-mind: a collective intelligence where everything moves at light speed, and permanence is all but non-existent. When one grows up under such circumstances, how does one’s idea of personal finance change?
Thinking Long and Short
Growing up in an age of tech-fueled commerce, it’s natural for the younger generation to be all too quick to spend and splurge impulsively. The prevailing marketing and advertising industry has gotten selling and persuasion down to an exact science, and this has started to unravel already. A recent survey by Northwestern Mutual revealed that over half of all respondents believed that making small purchases on a daily basis would have serious implications on their long-term financial health. This flips the logic that this generation is far too flippant with money and is a lot less financially literate than the ones that came before it.
In a study done jointly by public.com and Finimize, 64 per cent of those between the ages of 18 and 29 said that they discussed their finances with their families and friends while 41 per cent of GenZ respondents to a survey by Fidelity said that they turn to social media influencers to aid them in their financial decision-making. Clearly, this is a generation that knows the importance of money and takes full advantage of the tools that are available to improve their financial acumen. Many of them grew up in relatively modest households and had …….