Gen Z: “Nothing is open to me” – even the elite of tomorrow is worried about their future

Frankfurt. Louisa Tröger should actually be happy. If the 24-year-old has her master's degree in management under her belt, the world of work is likely to be waiting for top-trained talents like her. She is studying at the private university Frankfurt School of Finance & Management, one of Europe's leading business schools with an excellent reputation, strong network and the promise: “A world of possibilities”. However, she doesn't seem relaxed.

Instead, Tröger walks from stand to stand at her university's career fair, shaking hands, introducing herself and asking about internships. “I come from the green finance sector,” she says at the Landesbank Baden-Württemberg (LBBW) stand. There she finds out that there are currently twice as many applications as last year. As a farewell, one of the representatives gives her a goodie bag. Tröger asks: “Do you have an internship in there?”, laughs and moves on. Later she says: “Nothing is open to me.”

There is a lot to gain from the Frankfurt School's career days: the Deloittes, Goldman Sachses and BNPs of the world come into direct contact with students. There are QR codes for more exclusive applications, sometimes an interview directly at the stand. Some pay up to 44,000 euros for the master's degree alone. Nevertheless, you meet people here who say: “I feel like a fish in water that can’t swim.” Another says: “The lack of prospects is noticeable.”

Young people are currently moving the whole of Europe: in Serbia they overthrew the president, in France the country threatened to get out of control due to student protests, and in Germany experts feared something similar with the announced Gen Z protests. Although the protests were smaller than expected, the youth want to push the uprising further. A spokesman for “GenZ regulates” announced further demonstrations in Germany on November 20th. Among other things, they demand more money for schools, a fair distribution of burdens and an affordable life.

Young people are concerned about several things: there is the climate crisis, which will particularly affect later generations, pensions, which, with fewer and fewer births, are placing an ever greater burden on young people, wars that suddenly seem closer, or rents, which have risen so much in recent years that Bafög is no longer sufficient in many places to study.

Worries that rarely affect people here at the Frankfurt School, as they are at least mostly somewhat financially secure. And yet their insecurity is also growing. It's something else that moves her much more, says Louisa Tröger.

Tröger walks through the reception hall of the Frankfurt School with a shampoo from Procter & Gamble and a Deloitte jute bag. She picked up both at company stands. If you ask her whether she also feels the crisis among young people, she answers: “That’s exactly my topic” – and can hardly stop talking. “We are frustrated,” she says. Many people around her would want to emigrate.

However, this is not an option for Tröger: “Where to?” Things aren't necessarily better elsewhere. You then have to lose some of your security or freedom as a woman.

Her mother grew up in the GDR, she says. She is now sitting on a step and no longer has to speak so loudly against the hustle and bustle around the stands. It was clear to her mother that the world had limits and that not everything was possible for her. But then this world opened up, and Louisa Tröger was always told that everything was open to her. But the reality is different.

She studied business law for her bachelor's degree and graduated with a good grade. “After that, I wrote 80 job applications.” She only received any feedback twice and in the end no job came up. Not even an internship.

That's why she enrolled in a master's degree here at the private Frankfurt School. Tröger is certain: If young people weren't worried about not getting a job, fewer people would pay so much money for a degree here. “We are investing in more security,” she says.

The number of students at private universities has increased dramatically in recent years. In 2024/25, 384,000 people studied at private schools, Statista figures show. In the 2015/16 winter semester there were only 196,000 people. Students like Tröger hope to gain an advantage in the tight job market through the reputation and network of private universities.

In the first quarter of 2025, the proportion of advertised entry-level positions was 45 percent below the five-year average and even below the level in the first months of Corona, shows a Stepstone study that calculated the job situation using data from more than four million positions. Although the situation has improved somewhat in the current year, the pressure on the job market remains, according to the job exchange.

Tröger also says this: “If more and more jobs are lost, we will be deprived of the opportunity to maintain our standard of living.” She will soon have an interview for an internship at a larger bank. “Hundreds applied for it.”

Linda Varga and Julius Merz stand in front of the stand of the tax consulting and auditing company Forvis Mazars. Both are studying business administration part-time. When asked about the youth crisis, Merz said: “Funny, we just talked about it for half an hour.” And Varga, who just got a QR code to apply to a company, says: “You just don’t know what the future holds.”

The 20-year-old previously studied law for four semesters. “But I saw that AI can replace everything in law.” That's why she switched to dual business studies. That is safer.

The Stepstone study also names developments in the field of artificial intelligence as one of four main reasons. This is exactly what would replace junior jobs. Other reasons for the decline are remote work, Corona and the economy. "All four forces affect the same group, the more highly educated, computer-related employees. They are also the most exposed to AI, the most likely to work from home and the most likely to be affected by the tech downturn," the study authors conclude.

But there is also another phenomenon that Linda uses to explain the youth crisis: social media. "There I see people who pose with expensive watches and cars, they are the same age as me, all high performers who have made it. I then ask myself, why do they manage to do all this and I don't, even if I struggle?" That would be frustrating because you would feel even worse. “And then the grandparents come and say: ‘Work more.’ But I think to myself, hard work doesn’t guarantee success.”

After all, who can guarantee that the course you choose will later be the one that will guarantee you a job? That AI won't replace him, of all people?

Of course, there are also those who are hardly unsettled by the current situation at the career fair. They say they can understand the protests, but they won't take to the streets.

For example Timon Geiger and Felix Zeisler. They say that they are particularly well prepared for the world with AI at the Frankfurt School. Both are studying for a master's degree in finance and say that the use of AI is a topic in every course. They wouldn't be afraid of the future either; they would rather call it respect. But their industry is more conservative, and when it comes to pensions, you simply shouldn't rely on the state and make private provision.

But many are not as calm as these two. Louisa Tröger greets two acquaintances in a hallway. “Have you gotten a job yet?” she asks as she passes. “No, but a bottle,” one responds, pointing to his goodie.

Tröger says it's not so much an acute crisis that concerns her. Rather, it is an uncertainty about one's own identity. She could also have continued her legal studies and pursued a civil service career. “But who knows whether we will still be able to afford civil service in ten years?” she says.