Young people today “can be this century’s ‘Greatest Generation,’” according to pollster John Della Volpe, who predicts that Generation Z “will change America more than growing up in America will change them.” Gen Z, by his estimation, is so politically powerful that he credits them with Donald Trump’s 2020 defeat; they’re also “why Mitch McConnell is no longer Senate majority leader.” They are singularly dedicated to change—no other age group can compare: “Never before has a generation been so devoted to serving justice and solving the underlying issues that hold so many in America back from pursuing their best lives.”
These are extraordinary achievements—especially in such a short period of time—which is why Della Volpe imbues young people with an almost magical quality. Greta Thunberg, the 19-year-old climate activist from Sweden, for example, does not have skills but rather “superpowers.”
To Della Volpe, Gen Z is unique not only in its successes but in its suffering as well. Its members “have endured more adversity than any generation of young Americans in at least seventy years,”.
