Sebastian Leon Martinez had pounded the pavement for New York City mayoral candidate Zohran Mamdani from frigid 23-degree cold snaps in January to the 100-degree day in June when the young democratic socialist stunned the political establishment by winning the primary for the Democratic nomination.
That night, Martinez, a 20-year-old NYU student, found himself “sweaty, laughing, incredibly tired” at Mamdani’s victory party in Queens. It was a “monumental” moment, Martinez told me a week later. “A lot of people around me were crying and laughing,” he recalled. “Talking about how we’ve changed the political system, not only in New York City, but probably for the entire Democratic Party in the country.”
But as the 33-year-old candidate’s supporters cheered Mamdani’s win, business titans from Wall Street to Silicon Valley slid into panic mode at the thought of a socialist running New York City. Hedge fund billionaire Daniel Loeb warned of a “hot commie summer” in a post on X. Fellow billionaire hedge fund manager Bill Ackman pledged to bankroll any New York City mayoral candidate capable of defeating Mamdani.
Is Gen Z rejecting capitalism outright, some wondered, as their millennial counterparts tried to do with the Occupy Wall Street movement in 2011? Could Mamdani’s win spark a full embrace of socialism by the next generation, fulfilling dire predictions about the imminent demise of “late capitalism”?
In a word: no. That’s what I heard in a series of conversations with members of Gen Z and those who study them in the business and political spheres. Most scoffed at the notion that young people are rejecting capitalism on a large scale, or planning any kind of a revolution.
“We’re not seeing young people go live on communes,” said Shana Gadarian, a professor of political science at Syracuse University. “They’re working at banks, they’re starting gig economies, they’re working in high tech. If that’s not capitalism, I’m not clear what would be.”
If there’s a message for political and business leaders to glean from the youth movement buoying Mamdani, it’s perhaps a simpler one: Stop bullshitting us.
“What Gen Z is asking for is honesty,” explained Ziad Ahmed, the 26-year-old head of United Talent Agency’s Gen Z–focused marketing advisory practice, Next Gen. “If the world is on fire, tell me the world is on fire. Don’t tell me that actually, you might like the heat.”
I heard over and over that young people are deeply “discontented” or “disillusioned” with the status quo. Saad Amer, a New York–based climate activist and founder of the sustainability consultancy Justice Environment, said the next generation has been told a “fable” of how to succeed in America.
“What Gen Z is asking for is honesty. If the world is on fire, tell me the world is on fire. Don’t tell me that actually, you might like the heat.”
Ziad Ahmed, Head of Next Gen at United Talent Agency
“Young people are sold the story of, ‘Go to school, get good grades, go to college, and then you’ll get a great job, and you’ll own a home, and you’ll have a family,’” Amer said. “I look around at my peers, and that’s not true for any single one of them.” Instead, he said, he sees people “stuck in careers that they find unfulfilling—and that are also having disastrous impacts on their mental health and the planet at large. It’s clear that what we’re being told isn’t true.”
It’s not just liberal Gen Zers who feel this way. Rachel Janfaza, the 27-year-old founder of youth political culture newsletter The Up and Up, regularly holds listening sessions with young voters across the country. She has seen similar frustrations on the Republican side of the aisle, she said.
“I’ve certainly heard young people on the right who are very anti-billionaire and antiestablishment talk in the same way that we hear young people on the left,” she said. “This type of rhetoric exists on both sides. And I think there are a lot of similarities in why Trump resonates with young people and why perhaps Mamdani resonated with young people.”
Janfaza boils it down to one key issue: economic anxiety. And it’s not just in their heads. The average age of first-time U.S. homebuyers hit a record high last year at 38. In the country’s 30 largest metros, more than half of Gen Z renters are rent-burdened, spending more than 30% of their income on rent, Zillow found. And nearly a quarter of millennials and Gen Zers without children do not plan to become parents, primarily owing to financial stress, according to a recent report from MassMutual.
It’s no wonder, then, that instead of career politicians, Gen Zers are embracing outsider candidates who speak bluntly to this economic anxiety—a strength of Mamdani’s, and arguably Trump’s too. They’re done with dated rhetoric, PR talking points, and leaders “siloing themselves in boardrooms” instead of meeting Gen Zers where they are, Ahmed told me.
Business leaders, take note. Members of Gen Z aren’t just craving real talk—and action—from politicians; they’re also demanding it of their CEOs. Younger workers want the same things previous generations wanted: fair pay, rewarding work, mentorship, job security, a clear and fair path to advancement—and they’re not going to be content with kombucha-filled fridges or other office perks. This is a generation that has grown up with school shootings so frequent they’ve become normalized, with massive student debt, and in the shadow of a looming climate crisis. Of course they are demanding change—both from their politicians and their employers.
Charlene Li, an author who advises companies on digital transformation, told me that the two key value for Gen Z workers are honesty and fairness. Both require transparency: Leaders need to clearly state how success is measured and offer concrete opportunities and financial rewards to employees who meet these measures, she says.
Bleak outlook
Gen Z can’t take for granted the life milestones older generations expected to hit.
38 The record-high average age of first-time U.S. homebuyers in 2024
23%
Percentage of childless Millennials and Gen Zers who don’t plan to become parents, primarily for financial reasons Sources: National Association of Realtors; MassMutual
The word “purpose” is frequently used by consultancies and business advisors to describe what Gen Z truly wants in a workplace. But what does that look like in practice? At the Fortune Workplace Innovation Summit in May, Ahmed told me that workers should understand the “why” behind every business decision. Managers must clearly articulate their reasoning—to both their workers and customers, he said. “I don’t think it has to be as lofty as changing the world, because Gen Z also has a huge bullshit filter, and doesn’t want you to say that you stand for everything if you don’t,” Ahmed said. “Authenticity is everything.”
A good starting point would be a more straightforward discussion of diversity and equity, Li says. Instead of relying upon box-checking or acronyms such as DEI, she advises business leaders to take a hard look at the demographics of who is getting promotions and raises, and to think critically about company—and C-suite—makeup: “That’s what people are looking for, not just Gen Z,” she said. “We’re looking for some authenticity between what you have on your walls and on your websites and how you actually show up.”
Business leaders also need to listen to younger workers—their complaints, thoughts, and opinions about the business and the world. That doesn’t mean you need to hold a town hall tomorrow on the merits of Marxism, but it does require a certain level of respect and thoughtfulness, even for views that leaders disagree with.
“For Gen Z, politics are very personal,” Li said. “Work is going to be deeply personal to them. This is not something where they want to go in and just check off the list. So will you be ready to take that energy and bottle it and direct it?”
Mamdani’s win seems to have brought to the surface generational tensions and anxieties that had been simmering long before he became a political celebrity.
Elizabeth Spiers, a progressive digital strategist and journalist, said political and business leaders tend to conflate younger generations’ criticism of economic systems with political extremism. “They sort of treat capitalism like it’s a sacred cow that can never be spoken of in anything less than glowing terms,” Spiers said. But the precarities that young people face are real, she said: “They’ve grown up in an economic environment where a lot of those myths have sort of fallen apart in front of them.”
Addressing the disillusionment of young people who see corporate hierarchies as fundamentally unfair will take more than just better workplace communication; young people are also demanding real action to improve their economic prospects, both from politicians and from the business world.
Amer, who advises Fortune 500 C-suite executives on climate impact, said he has been “seeing the fear” in business leaders’ eyes when talking about how to work with and engage a young workforce.
“These corporations do have a role that they should be playing, and I think they are actively trying to figure out the role,” he said. “But to the younger generation, the role seems obvious: Do better.”
This articleappears in the August/September issue of Fortune with the headline “Gen Z’s wake-up call to corporate America.”
SpaceX is preparing to sell insider shares in a transaction that would value Elon Musk’s rocket and satellite maker at as much as $800 billion, people familiar with the matter said, reclaiming the title of the world’s most valuable private company.
The details, discussed by SpaceX’s board of directors on Thursday at its Starbase hub in Texas, could change based on interest from insider sellers and buyers or other factors, said some of the people, who asked not to be identified as the information isn’t public. SpaceX is also exploring a possible initial public offering as soon as late next year, one of the people said.
Another person briefed on the matter said that the price under discussion for the sale of some employees and investors’ shares is higher than $400 apiece, which would value SpaceX at between $750 billion and $800 billion. The company wouldn’t raise any funds though this planned sale, though a successful offering at such levels would catapult it past the record of $500 billion valuation achieved by OpenAI in October.
Elon Musk on Saturday denied that SpaceX is raising money at a $800 billion valuation without addressing Bloomberg’s reporting on the planned offering of insiders’ shares.
“SpaceX has been cash flow positive for many years and does periodic stock buybacks twice a year to provide liquidity for employees and investors,” Musk said in a post on his social media platform X.
The share sale price under discussion would be a substantial increase from the $212 a share set in July, when the company raised money and sold shares at a valuation of $400 billion. The Wall Street Journal and Financial Times earlier reported the $800 billion valuation target.
News of SpaceX’s valuation sent shares of EchoStar Corp., a satellite TV and wireless company, up as much as 18%. Last month, EchoStar had agreed to sell spectrum licenses to SpaceX for $2.6 billion, adding to an earlier agreement to sell about $17 billion in wireless spectrum to Musk’s company.
The world’s most prolific rocket launcher, SpaceX dominates the space industry with its Falcon 9 rocket that lifts satellites and people to orbit.
SpaceX is also the industry leader in providing internet services from low-Earth orbit through Starlink, a system of more than 9,000 satellites that is far ahead of competitors including Amazon.com Inc.’s Amazon Leo.
Elite Group
SpaceX is among an elite group of companies that have the ability to raise funds at $100 billion-plus valuations while delaying or denying they have any plan to go public.
An IPO of the company at an $800 billion value would vault SpaceX into another rarefied group — the 20 largest public companies, a few notches below Musk’s Tesla Inc.
If SpaceX sold 5% of the company at that valuation, it would have to sell $40 billion of stock — making it the biggest IPO of all time, well above Saudi Aramco’s $29 billion listing in 2019. The firm sold just 1.5% of the company in that offering, a much smaller slice than the majority of publicly traded firms make available.
A listing would also subject SpaceX to the volatility of being a public company, versus private firms whose valuations are closely guarded secrets. Space and defense company IPOs have had a mixed reception in 2025. Karman Holdings Inc.’s stock has nearly tripled since its debut, while Firefly Aerospace Inc. and Voyager Technologies Inc. have plunged by double-digit percentages since their debuts.
SpaceX executives have repeatedly floated the idea of spinning off SpaceX’s Starlink business into a separate, publicly traded company — a concept President Gwynne Shotwell first suggested in 2020.
However, Musk cast doubt on the prospect publicly over the years and Chief Financial Officer Bret Johnsen said in 2024 that a Starlink IPO would be something that would take place more likely “in the years to come.”
The Information, citing people familiar with the discussions, separately reported on Friday that SpaceX has told investors and financial institution representatives that it’s aiming for an IPO of the entire company in the second half of next year.
A so-called tender or secondary offering, through which employees and some early shareholders can sell shares, provides investors in closely held companies such as SpaceX a way to generate liquidity.
SpaceX is working to develop its new Starship vehicle, advertised as the most powerful rocket ever developed to loft huge numbers of Starlink satellites as well as carry cargo and people to moon and, eventually, Mars.
The National Park Service will offer free admission to U.S. residents on President Donald Trump’s birthday next year — which also happens to be Flag Day — but is eliminating the benefit for Martin Luther King Jr. Day and Juneteenth.
The new list of free admission days for Americans is the latest example of the Trump administration downplaying America’s civil rights history while also promoting the president’s image, name and legacy.
Last year, the list of free days included Martin Luther King Jr Day and Juneteenth — which is June 19 — but not June 14, Trump’s birthday.
The new free-admission policy takes effect Jan. 1 and was one of several changes announced by the Park Service late last month, including higher admission fees for international visitors.
The other days of free park admission in 2026 are Presidents Day, Memorial Day, Independence Day, Constitution Day, Veterans Day, President Theodore Roosevelt’s birthday (Oct. 27) and the anniversary of the creation of the Park Service (Aug. 25).
Eliminating Martin Luther King Jr. Day and Juneteenth, which commemorates the day in 1865 when the last enslaved Americans were emancipated, removes two of the nation’s most prominent civil rights holidays.
Some civil rights leaders voiced opposition to the change after news about it began spreading over the weekend.
“The raw & rank racism here stinks to high heaven,” Harvard Kennedy School professor Cornell William Brooks, a former president of the NAACP, wrote on social media about the new policy.
Kristen Brengel, a spokesperson for the National Parks Conservation Association, said that while presidential administrations have tweaked the free days in the past, the elimination of Martin Luther King Jr. Day is particularly concerning. For one, the day has become a popular day of service for community groups that use the free day to perform volunteer projects at parks.
That will now be much more expensive, said Brengel, whose organization is a nonprofit that advocates for the park system.
“Not only does it recognize an American hero, it’s also a day when people go into parks to clean them up,” Brengel said. “Martin Luther King Jr. deserves a day of recognition … For some reason, Black history has repeatedly been targeted by this administration, and it shouldn’t be.”
Some Democratic lawmakers also weighed in to object to the new policy.
“The President didn’t just add his own birthday to the list, he removed both of these holidays that mark Black Americans’ struggle for civil rights and freedom,” said Democratic Sen. Catherine Cortez Masto of Nevada. “Our country deserves better.”
A spokesperson for the National Park Service did not immediately respond to questions on Saturday seeking information about the reasons behind the changes.
JPMorgan Chase & Co. Chief Executive Officer Jamie Dimon called out slow bureaucracy in Europe in a warning that a “weak” continent poses a major economic risk to the US.
“Europe has a real problem,” Dimon said Saturday at the Reagan National Defense Forum. “They do some wonderful things on their safety nets. But they’ve driven business out, they’ve driven investment out, they’ve driven innovation out. It’s kind of coming back.”
While he praised some European leaders who he said were aware of the issues, he cautioned politics is “really hard.”
Dimon, leader of the biggest US bank, has long said that the risk of a fragmented Europe is among the major challenges facing the world. In his letter to shareholders released earlier this year, he said that Europe has “some serious issues to fix.”
On Saturday, he praised the creation of the euro and Europe’s push for peace. But he warned that a reduction in military efforts and challenges trying to reach agreement within the European Union are threatening the continent.
“If they fragment, then you can say that America first will not be around anymore,” Dimon said. “It will hurt us more than anybody else because they are a major ally in every single way, including common values, which are really important.”
He said the US should help.
“We need a long-term strategy to help them become strong,” Dimon said. “A weak Europe is bad for us.”
The administration of President Donald Trump issued a new national security strategy that directed US interests toward the Western Hemisphere and protection of the homeland while dismissing Europe as a continent headed toward “civilizational erasure.”
JPMorgan has been ramping up its push to spur more investments in the national defense sector. In October, the bank announced that it would funnel $1.5 trillion into industries that bolster US economic security and resiliency over the next 10 years — as much as $500 billion more than what it would’ve provided anyway.
Dimon said in the statement that it’s “painfully clear that the United States has allowed itself to become too reliant on unreliable sources of critical minerals, products and manufacturing.”
Investment banker Jay Horine oversees the effort, which Dimon called “100% commercial.” It will focus on four areas: supply chain and advanced manufacturing; defense and aerospace; energy independence and resilience; and frontier and strategic technologies.
The bank will also invest as much as $10 billion of its own capital to help certain companies expand, innovate or accelerate strategic manufacturing.
Separately on Saturday, Dimon praised Trump for finding ways to roll back bureaucracy in the government.
“There is no question that this administration is trying to bring an axe to some of the bureaucracy that held back America,” Dimon said. “That is a good thing and we can do it and still keep the world safe, for safe food and safe banks and all the stuff like that.”
Politics8 years ago