Gen Z's broke future: Glaring data from superannuation report exposes foundational problem modern conservativism faces

Sky News AU

2 days ago

A survey released by Finder this week is another glaring example of the problem Australian conservatives have spreading their message.
The survey investigated people's attitudes towards their superannuation - asking 'do you think you'll have enough superannuation to get by in retirement?'.
About 20 per cent said they will not have enough in either their super or investments, 10 per cent believed they wouldn't have enough in super, but would in other investments.
And 27 per cent said they didn't know if they would have enough super or not, and another 20 per cent thought they would have enough - but would need to cut back on spending.
Just 24 per cent of respondents believed they would have enough money to comfortably retire.
Sure - most people aren't experts on superannuation.
A lot of people would struggle to come up with a ballpark figure of how much money is in their superannuation account, what will it likely be when they retire or how much money one needs to retire.
But that's not the point.
The point is - to 77 per cent of Australians, it doesn't feel like they are going to have a retirement to look forward to.
The bad news for the 'vibe' of Australians doesn't stop there.
A report by the Australian Housing and Urban Research Institute in November found 59 per cent of private renters believed they would never be able to afford their own home.
The e61 Institute last month found that 'the average age of final repayment [of student debt] rose from 32.7 in 2012 to 34.8 in 2022'.
On face value, this should be good for conservatives politically.
The Labor Party are now in their second term in government, and if Australians are pessimistic about the economy and their future they will want to change the leader.
But really - this is a crossroads moment for conservatism.
Conservatism at its heart is a backwards-looking ideology.
It insists that society was operating effectively at a past point, and still is in most cases - so wants to act as a handbrake on further change that would undermine what was working.
But for the message of conservatism to pass on, the listener must accept the premise that society is working.
They have to believe there is a society worth fighting to protect.
Konstantin Kisin told the Alliance for Responsible Citizneship conference in 2013: 'you will never get young people to want to conserve a society and an economy that is not working for them.'
He was talking in Britain but could easily have been talking about Australia.
If you are a young Australian who does not believe you will ever afford a house, are not confident you'll have enough money to retire and correctly believe it will take you longer to pay off your student debt - then you are not going to believe society is working.
You are also unlikely to be thankful that society was working well at one point in the past, since your struggles are downstream of whatever 'good times' came before you.
Former generations may tell you that buying a house has always been a challenge, but when in 2002 an average house in Sydney cost 8.3 times the average full-time wage and today it is 14.4 times the average full-time wage - well, the empathy rings hollow.
Conservatives are not going to win young people to their ideology or their political parties through appealing to a positive vision of the past, or a negative vision of a future derailed by radical change.
It will bounce off young people like a tennis ball against a wall.
In fact, radical change can sound kind of appealing to people who think their lives will be spent meandering through a country's decline - and the parties and people that push the radical change start to sound quite appealing.
Thankfully, Australia's brushes with 'radical parties' have been barely noticeable so far - with the Greens satisfied reliving their university activist days through meaningless Parliamentary stunts that don't actually hurt anyone, and Fatima Payman thinking becoming the Gen Z spokespolitician means merely seeing how many Gen Z phrases she could cram into one Senate address.
But they could be coming.
History has plenty of examples of disaffected, lost and angry generations turning to disgusting leaders - if only because they offered a rope out of the pit.
Conservatives must instead appeal to a positive vision of the future.
They must demonstrate how conservative values can build a better society, rather than return to an old one.
Because appeals to rebuild an era young people did not live in, and protect a time they do not enjoy, are doomed to fail.
James Bolt is a SkyNews.com.au contributor