What Does “Success” Mean To Hispanic Millennials?
In today’s economy, jobs that were once abundant are now a scarce commodity. Many young people who grew up with high hopes of landing their dream jobs once they finish college have found their options to be severely limited.
So what does it mean to be successful in a world where the elements that defined it to past generations—money, success, power—are so much harder to come by?
Tr3s talked to Latinos and non-Latinos ages 19 to 34 about what the meaning of success as part of its 2014 study, “Hispanic Adult Millennials at Work and Play.”
From that project, here are key insights on the subject of success:
Millennials take a more inner-oriented perspective, striving for the “best possible me.” For about 45% of Hispanic (and non-Hispanic) Adult Millennials, success is about being self-fulfilled, being a good person, doing a good job, and managing stress. Where in the past, Hispanics were more directly oriented toward caretaking/providing, now many see being their best selves as connected to their ability to give back to family, friends, and community. In particular, self-fulfillment defines success more to younger adult Millennials (20% of Hispanics 19-29 vs. 14% of Hispanics 30-34). Hispanic females are also significantly more motivated by self-fulfillment than males.
Being a caretaker/provider is the second most common way of defining success. Nearly 1 in 3 Hispanics and non-Hispanics 19-34 feel that taking care of their families and helping others are the key to success. Taking care of their families is significantly more important to 30-34s (28%), who are more likely to have families of their own, than to 19-29s (19%). Unemployed Hispanics are much more likely than those with jobs to say that success means taking care of their families (27% of unemployed, 19% of employed).
The high-status trappings of prior generations don’t say “success” to most Millennials. Hispanic and non-Hispanic Millennials are less status-conscious than prior generations and less motivated by money, things, titles, and power. (Just 13% of Hispanics and 16% of non-Hispanics say these things define success to them.)
1 in 10 Hispanic Millennials believe that success is mere survival. For a minority, success is just getting by: keeping a job and making a living (9% of Hispanics and 6% of non-Hispanics).