Can't Even: How Millennials Became the Burnout Generation

by Anne Helen Petersen

Lily, who went to a prep school in New York, told me that she never even considered not going to college: “My oldest sister almost didn’t, and the narrative in the family was that she was in danger of failing at life and dooming herself.” That’s a common refrain amongst many millennials—especially amongst the middle class, or anyone who wanted to escape their town, or find something better than what their parents had. “It never occurred to me that college was optional,” Caroline, who graduated in 2000 from a high school near La Jolla, California, said, “or that my life would be worth living without a college degree.”