Gen Zers want to help, they really do, if the work pays well enough

By Avni Trivedi, CNN

(CNN) — When given the opportunity to help others and make a positive impact, Gen Z is saying “yes.”

Members of the younger generation overwhelmingly want to aid others through their work, and these care-focused jobs can help their overall mental well-being, a new poll has found.

Nearly 80% of Gen Zers in the United States said they were interested in jobs that aim to help other people, according to a survey released Wednesday by Gallup, which partnered with the Walton Family Foundation and Harvard University’s Making Caring Common Project.

“In a time where loneliness and mental health struggles are an issue for Gen Z, this data is showing that they want to help people and they are struggling to find that meaning and purpose in life,” said Katherine Senseman, a research consultant for Gallup.

The Gallup Voices of Gen Z study highlights a correlation between two aspects of life. Of those who agreed with making a positive impact in others’ lives, 89% strongly agreed or agreed that they felt their life was meaningful.

“Helping others is good for our mental health, and lots of Gen Zers lack meaning and purpose, which is really not good for your mental health,” said Richard Weissbourd, faculty director of the Making Caring Common Project and senior lecturer at the Harvard Graduate School of Education. “They’re finding meaning and purpose in helping others.”

This data has helped researchers gain a better understanding of how purpose manifests in people’s lives, and how it can be linked to the intention to do things for other people, said Anthony Burrow, an associate professor of psychology at Cornell University in Ithaca, New York, who was not involved in the survey.

However, Gen Zers also cited reasons for not finding such meaning.

Barriers to a meaningful life

As digital natives, Gen Zers are aware of their attachment to screens, with more than half citing their unproductive use of technology as a significant barrier to developing a meaningful life. Nearly half acknowledged mental health issues, and 34% felt their lack of personal relationships was a factor that contributed to feeling purposeless.

Even though care-focused jobs could lead to overcoming some of these barriers, the jobs themselves present some concerns.

Nearly half of Gen Zers cited worries about their finances and personal well-being as deterrents from looking for jobs focused on helping others. Young people didn’t think these types of jobs paid enough money and felt the roles were often more emotionally draining than others.

Half of those polled cited a job that made enough money, without being too stressful, as what they wanted most out of their career, so low-pay, high-stress care-focused work clashed with their priorities.

Furthermore, the pressure of simply finding meaning in life can overwhelm. More than half of Gen Z adults agreed the pressure they felt to achieve in life stressed them out, with especially high agreement between younger adults ages 19 to 21.

Achievement pressure and the pressure to find meaning in life go hand in hand, Weissbourd noted.

“It’s partly the amount of achievement pressure, but it’s also why you are achieving something,” Weissbourd said. “If you have a purpose for it, you’re likely to be in better mental health.”

Gallup and its partners conducted the survey in December 2025 and sampled 2,436 young people, between the ages of 13 and 28, living in the United States.

How to motivate Gen Z’s drive to help others

When asked if they would take a higher-paying job over a more meaningful job, almost half of Gen Zers said they would. But, if money wasn’t an issue and they already lived on a comfortable salary, most young people said they would keep the original job.

More than half of Gen Zers said doing work that was personally fulfilling was within their top three priorities, and 25% ranked helping and caring for others up top, as well.

“This is a story of opportunity,” Burrow said. “When presented with an opportunity to do something that is purposeful or meaningful, by and large, this generations says, ‘I want to do that.’”

He urged hiring managers, educators and older generations to take this information as a way to adjust views on the younger generation.

That could also look like hiring recruiters adding information to job postings about some of the community outreach a company does, or school administrators establishing programs that explore aspects of careers that provide a sense of purpose to students.

“Those barriers then become opportunities for organizations or companies to — or even schools — to do the preparatory work, to speak to how experiences and tasks and workflows could actually support and sustain something like purpose in life,” Burrow said.

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