Millennials believed in hard work’s importance while resenting it and fleeing into FIRE ideology

Evidence

Seventy-three percent of American millennials believed that hard work was crucial to “getting ahead in life”—and yet they also resented that fact. Many sought refuge in the FIRE movement: “financial independence, retire early.” Early adopters were “stoic ultraminimalists” who embraced delayed gratification, subsisting on beans today to fund globetrotting tomorrow. Over time, the most popular strain became “FatFIRE,” in which hacks and shortcuts promised to yield fortunes large enough for early, luxurious retirement. If Zuckerberg could make billions by cloning Friendster and Myspace, certainly others could find their own stash of gold in the app economy. Software was an enticingly low-overhead business: Write some code, join a display ad network, and pick a name that dropped vowels, like Tumblr, Scribd, or Grindr. — W. David Marx, Blank Space, 322

Categorization

• XREF: Supports the omnivore monoculture thesis — aspirational entrepreneurship as a flattened, universally-consumed ideology rather than distinct subcultural identities.