The Millenials :
Millennials are sometimes referred to as “echo boomers” due to a major surge in birth rates in the 1980s and 1990s, and because millennials are often the children of the baby boomers.
Gen Z :
Generation Z has the mid-1990s to mid-2000s as starting birth years, they’ve used the Internet since a young age, and they are generally comfortable with technology and with interacting on social media.
Millennials are about to be surpassed by Generation Z. Gen Z will comprise 32 percent of the global population of 7.7 billion in 2019, nudging ahead of millennials, who will account for a 31.5 percent share, based on Bloomberg analysis of United Nations data, and using 2000/2001 as the generational split.
A report compares the two generations, describing Millenials as ‘entitled’, ‘idealist’, ‘creative’ and ‘dependant’ and labeling Gen Z as ‘realist’, ‘innovative’ and ‘self-reliant’.
“The key factor that differentiated these two groups, other than their age, was an element of self-awareness versus self-centeredness,” according to “Rise of Gen Z: New Challenge for Retailers,” a report by Marcie Merriman, an executive director at Ernst & Young LLP.
The Gen Z surpassing the Millenials brings forth a new era for most countries with a high youth population, the effect of their internet-influenced consciousness is already evident in the trends of the time. According to a report by research firm Nielsen Holdings Plc. “Gen Z are bombarded with messages and are a generation that can quickly detect whether or not something is relevant to them.”
METHODOLOGY: UN population division data reports population by five-year age groups. Headcounts for less than five full-year groups (i.e., Gen Z population ages 15-18) were extrapolated based on general distribution pattern. The 2019 Gen Z population was calculated by estimating crude births in 2019, adjusted for infant mortality (death per 1,000 live births for those under age 1), adding 2018 total Gen Z, adjusted for those affected by under five/child mortality not yet counted, millennial population in 2019 adjusted by the general adult mortality rate.
