We can fear the inherent uncertainty of the future, or we can embrace the wide range of possibilities that might emerge and identify how we might influence them.

by Katie King

How the future will unfold for today’s young children depends on a wide range of factors: climate change, technological developments, economic shifts, among others. But another primary influence will be much closer to home: the values, priorities and expectations of their parents and the choices that they make as a result. This post digs into Capita’s recent brief, “What to Expect as Gen Z Starts to Parent,” to explore how the Gen Z generation in the United States might approach the timeless act of parenting.

Critical Uncertainties

The inevitable uncertainty about what the future holds can make discussion about what we might experience or what we hope to see feel overwhelming. However, if we can narrow down to a couple of critical questions that we believe are important for the future and that have a range of possible outcomes, we can focus our thinking and begin to craft our responses. Two critical uncertainties that emerged from the brief that are worthy of deeper exploration are:

Will Gen Z have high or low expectations of the government? Gen Z is more likely than older generations to look to the government, over businesses or individuals, to solve problems. At the same time, their level of trust in traditional institutions is low. These competing realities mean that we do not yet know what they will expect and demand of the government. Whether they expect the government to have a meaningful and positive influence on their lives will affect how they engage in society and create their families.
Will Gen Z forgo creating families that include children, or will they create new types of family configurations? Gen Z tends to be highly concerned about the future and pessimistic about our collective ability to tackle big problems. At the same time, they hold broad definitions of what makes a family and what constitutes a meaningful relationship. These two perspectives could lead this generation to skip any kind of childbearing and child-rearing. Or they could lead Gen Z to reimagine what a family looks like and create families in ways that fit their views of the world.

Future Possibilities

These uncertainties suggest four possible scenarios for how Gen Z might approach parenting.

Parente Non Grata
High Expectations of Government/Forgo Creating Families That Include Children
Families’ needs occupy the back burner as other issues take center stage.

In this scenario, Gen Z engages actively with the government, advocating for its beliefs and expecting action from elected officials. In addition, a large majority of the generation has chosen not to build their families around children. As a whole, Gen Z is deeply engaged on issues such as climate, racial justice, and the economy. While the government has taken meaningful action on these issues, their intersection with family life is often ignored. Parents feel increasingly isolated, with fewer and fewer peers who share their experiences and a government that does not see them as a primary constituency. Technology has become a chief strategy for meeting the caregiving needs of the older population. The federal government attempts to promote family formation and is supportive of immigration. These efforts are focused squarely on growing the population of young people and meeting the obligations of the economy and older Americans, which means the deeper needs of families often go unaddressed.

All in the Family
High Expectations of Government/Create New Types of Family Configurations
Shifting norms and supports create greater inclusion and challenges to meet ever-changing needs.

This is a future in which Gen Z is engaged with the government and has eagerly entered into family creation, though its families often do not fit traditional molds. Because of the generation’s activism and advocacy, the United States enjoys new structures and funding mechanisms to support a broad range of families, opening economic and social benefits -- both explicit and previously implicit -- to groups in non-traditional living and co-parenting arrangements. Social narratives about what makes a family have shifted, and LGBTQ+ individuals and families in particular experience higher levels of visibility, inclusion, and equity. Financial and social support for an expanded range of fertility options has become mainstream, as have broader definitions of who is classified as a parent. The government aims to maintain high levels of trust among parents, but it also struggles to keep up with shifting norms and the ever-changing needs that accompany new family configurations. Because not everyone has shifted their beliefs about what makes a legitimate family, political divides continue to deepen.

Shadow Systems
Low Expectations of Government/Create New Types of Family Configurations
All kinds of families chart their own paths forward, and informal structures and private industry fill gaps left when the government is unable to meet shifting needs.

This is a future in which Gen Z has lost trust and hope in the government’s willingness or ability to be a positive force in their lives. In addition, they have continued to pursue family creation on their own terms. They have created, and rely on, strong, mutual aid networks to meet their needs, creating many close-knit, highly localized, and responsive communities. These networks rely on in-person relationships, though they are often augmented by digital spaces. Families that live outside of those communities have very little formal or informal support and look to any structure they can. Private industry has found a void that it is aiming to fill, shoring up their power among some segments of the population as more and more people look to them to meet their basic needs. As people’s daily lives become more disconnected from the government, trust-building opportunities are few and far between, creating a vicious cycle of low trust that leads some people to reject the need for their families to be formally recognized by the government and to go off the official social grid. Many divisions have emerged -- between traditional and new kinds of families, between people who prefer their self-organized communities and those who continue to push for a larger government role -- and groups compete for voice and power in a highly complex and fragmented social landscape.

Under Pressure
Low Expectations of Government/Forgo Creating Families That Include Children
Economic and social structures that rely on young people falter, and the ties that bind fray.

This is a future in which Gen Z is disengaged and disconnected from the government and has abandoned child-bearing and child-rearing in droves. Its members do not see much use for the government in general. Because of that, a major anti-tax movement emerges, even among progressives who have come to believe that they can find better ways to meet society’s needs. Public systems that rely on a strong tax base and on the buy-in of younger people, such as public education and social security, deteriorate. The United States finally enacts sweeping criminal justice reform, but with rather cynical motives: to keep working-age people in the economy as the country faces a population cliff. Communities across the nation experience high levels of physical mobility, with few people setting down roots in any one place. Populations fluctuate, creating high levels of turnover and instability in local support structures, such as child care centers, and leading to more scarcity of those resources and structures.

What else might families and children experience in any of these futures? What other features can you envision at the intersection of these uncertainties?

Directions for Stakeholders

Exploring future possibilities can surface insights and new ideas, but it should also point stakeholders toward action. Looking across the four scenarios, a few implications for actions emerge.

Accept flexible family formations. Given Gen Z’s attitudes toward families, leaders should embrace family formation in any configuration. They need to acknowledge that families other than traditional ones already exist and that they often struggle in the current landscape. They also need to anticipate that their numbers will grow. Leaders should rethink benefits and how they define families in ways that prioritize inclusion, particularly for those who experience other forms of marginalization.
Communicate the social benefits of healthy families. Several of these scenarios point to the possible collapse of economic or social structures that rely on the presence of young people in society. Leaders need to clarify their own understanding of how the health of families supports the health of society. Then they need to communicate this connection clearly to build public will for family supports.
Provide support at multiple levels. The Federal government alone can never be as responsive as families need it to be, particularly in a rapidly changing environment where people’s needs shift continuously. Leaders should be prepared to invest in and operate structures in a variety of spheres, from the hyper-local to nationwide, to ensure that people get what they need and retain trust in the institutions meant to serve them, and that they have a voice in decisions that affect them.
Use current political capital to invest in long-term futures. Regardless of how Gen Z engages with the government, the well-being of families and young children should not be contingent on political winds. In a time when public support for families is high, leaders should explore ways to create long-term and ongoing stability for families, expecting that attitudes and systems will change but that needs for food, housing, education, culture, belonging, and dignity will never fade.

What other implications or questions came up for you as you read the scenarios? What actions could you or other leaders take or begin to explore today?

Explore Other Possibilities

These future possibilities for Gen Z as parents are far from the only ones. You can explore other possibilities by using your own 2x2 scenario matrix.

Identify two critical uncertainties. Consider major questions you have about the future of young children and families, particularly about the generation just entering adulthood. Capita’s brief offers questions about Gen Z’s mental health and relationship to technology that can serve as starting points for articulating additional uncertainties.
Plot the uncertainties on a matrix, with the ends of each axis being labeled with the extreme outcomes of the uncertainty. Though we rarely experience the most extreme outcomes of any uncertainty, naming the opposite poles enables us to surface novel possibilities, opportunities, and challenges.
Populate the quadrants, articulating scenarios that might happen at the intersection of these two outcomes. Be specific about what each quadrant might look like, letting go of any need to be sure that what you have described could come to pass. Consider the daily lives and experiences of young children and Gen Z parents and push your thinking beyond what seems possible or likely today.
Consider what each scenario might mean for you, your organization, or other stakeholders. For which scenarios do you feel prepared? Unprepared? What new approaches, mindsets, partnerships, or models might you need to pursue in order to ensure that you are doing all you can to support young children and families, no matter what types of choices Gen Zers make for their lives and families?

Shaping the Future for Young Children and Families

We can fear the inherent uncertainty of the future, or we can embrace the wide range of possibilities that might emerge and identify how we might influence them. At a time when systems are shifting and people are asking deep questions about how we should structure our society to meet people’s needs, leaders have a unique opportunity to take ownership over their own role in shaping the future for young children and families.

Katie King is the director of strategic foresight engagement at KnowledgeWorks. In her role, Katie manages externally facing strategic foresight projects and partnerships, co-designs and delivers workshops and contributes to KnowledgeWorks’ publications about the future of learning. Katie has previously served as a consulting futurist for various nonprofit organizations and taught middle school English in Texas and California. Katie holds a bachelor’s in journalism from the University of Southern California and a master’s in foresight from the University of Houston. She is a member of the Association of Professional Futurists and co-author of The Futures Thinking Playbook.

What to Expect as Gen Z Starts to Parent: Four Scenarios for the Future