According to The Atlantic, the millennial generation, defined as people between the ages of 16 and 34, has a insatiable hunger for travel when compared with older generations. The Boston Consulting group held a study that found millennials to be more interested in travel than other generations by almost 23%. About 20% of all travelers, according to the United Nations, are people, which means that there are about 40 million young travelers. Since 2007, there has been an increase in tourism revenue by almost 30%.
This generation is also changing the standards of travel. Rather than a quick enjoyable vacation, most young travelers are leaving on longer trips trying to have more meaningful experiences. These people are, more often than not, traveling to some remote location rather than an established tourism hub.
With the advent of travel planners and tools, young people are finding that long-term travel is cheaper than they previously expected. Rather than saving up for an uncertain trip in an uncertain future, people are starting to jump for the chance to travel rather than wait.
A huge factor in this change of attitude towards waiting for a more prudent time to take a trip is that confidence in future stability is at a low for recent years. In 1983, 88% of private-sector workers had benefit coverage for retirement. Now, it is under 33%.
The companies offering pensions has fallen by 80%. Americans are no longer confident that they will receive financial support as they age. 90% of mi
llennials believe that Social Security benefits will be reduced when they are of the age to collect, while over 50% of those people don’t believe Social Security will exist at all.
The job market for millenials has also been especially bad. Many who have had trouble finding jobs decide to travel in order to take a break and see what extra-local possibilities they may have.
Travel has become an outlet of fulfillment for much of today’s youth. Rather than stick with a job they hate, or continue searching fruitlessly for one, millenials have started to take long-term trips of fulfillment.
