The optimism gap between young and older American workers is now the widest in the world, according to new Gallup data. Just 43% of U.S. adults aged 15 to 34 believed it was a good time to find a local job in 2025, compared with 64% of those 55 and older — a 21-point chasm that exceeds any other country surveyed.
This generational divide is an outlier globally. In most of the 141 nations polled, younger people are either more optimistic than their elders, or the generations' views are closely aligned. Double-digit gaps appeared in only five other places: Serbia, the UAE, Hong Kong, Norway, and China, where the generation gap stood at 12 points.
The finding underscores a broader malaise among younger Americans about their economic prospects. The global median shows a 10-point divide in the opposite direction — with older adults generally more pessimistic. President Trump and China's leader Xi Jinping, who meet this week, share the commonality of discouraged youth in their respective countries.
Younger Americans' low assessment of their job prospects persists despite a historically tight labor market. The disconnect suggests that factors such as inflation, housing costs, or structural shifts in industries may be weighing more heavily on younger workers' outlook than on their older counterparts.
Some analysts caution that Gallup's optimism measure captures sentiment, not hard economic data, and may overstate the severity of the gap. Older workers' relative positivity could reflect their experience through past downturns rather than stronger job prospects.