The issues that define China’s millennials | WARC | The Feed

The issues that define China’s millennials

China counts 400 millennials among its population, a generation born between 1981 and 1996 that is now solidly in adulthood and reflects deep changes in the country.

Why it matters

Across the world, millennials are no longer a synonym for capricious, late-teenage consumers who “love experiences” – with some now in their forties, the difference between the effects of becoming adults, and the particular traits of their generation are becoming clearer.

Details

As explored in a report by Insider, Chinese millennials’ have grown up in a time of economic acceleration in contrast to their American counterparts’ perpetual crises.

• These are the children of a generation that needed to survive, whereas millennials are more likely to experience leisure as a result of their hard work.
• The typical salary for a Chinese millennial is $22,000, around $1,200 less than the older generation.
• Online shopping is as much a hobby as a way of acquiring goods, with 77% of respondents to one survey saying shopping on Taobao was their favourite activity.
• They are under immense pressure to succeed. This involves, getting a job, buying a house, and ,with those credentials sorted, finding a spouse. If you also have a car, then you’ve hit another pillar of perceived success.
• Home ownership is incredibly common, but families will often scrape together whatever they have and plunge into deep debt in order to do this. The average millennial has $20,000 worth of debt, as a result. Still this is less than the typical US student loan debt, which ranges from between $25-40,000.
• Graduates tend to have little debt, with university fees much cheaper than other parts of the world and with parental savings common. Almost 100m millennials have bachelor’s degrees, making the job market for high-level roles intensely competitive.
• Attitudes to marriage are changing, with millennials marrying later, if at all. This is also indicative of greater educational and career opportunities for women.

Sourced from Insider