GEN Y AT WORK: Millenials want more vacation and time for themselves away from the job than young people did 30 years ago, and they also value compensation more, according to a recent study.
That may be setting them up for intense disappointments in today's labor market.
Those born starting in the early 1980s put a bigger emphasis on time away from work than previous generations. They're slightly less likely to say that work should be "a very central part" of one's life, and tend to value a job more for salary and advancement opportunities rather than as a source of friends or an avenue to learn new skills.
Gen Y, the youngest generation in American workplaces, may see time off as necessary because of how hard they saw their parents work, said San Diego State University psychology professor Jean Twenge. She has a study analyzing generational differences in attitudes toward work in an upcoming issue of the Journal of Management.
But as unemployment has grown for young people, their expectations for money, job promotion and leisure time are encountering workplace reality. In today's world, that means tepid growth in salaries and benefits, and heavy competition for positions.
The Conference Board, a private research group, said in January that job satisfaction for those under 25 was at a record low in 2009.
"High expectations are colliding with reality and leading to a lot of disappointment and dissatisfaction," said Twenge.
In her study, Twenge culled data from high school seniors taking the annual "Monitoring the Future" survey in 1976, 1991 and 2006. About 15,000 seniors nationwide take the survey each spring.
The 2008 report, from after the recession began, showed that 17-and 18-year-olds valued leisure time away from work even more than they had two years before, Twenge said.
And other surveys second this finding, despite the recession. College students in summer 2009 said they valued job security more than in previous years, but they also continued to say work-life balance was important, according to a survey by Universum, a human resources consultancy.
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HEALTHY COMMUNITIES, HEALTHY BODIES: Obese people were more likely to live in parts of the country with less access to both affordable produce and safe places to exercise than thinner people, according to a recent survey.
Those who lived in places where residents said they sometimes didn't have enough money to buy food were also more likely to be obese.
Gallup randomly surveyed 353,000 U.S. adults throughout 2009. It found that of the 10 metropolitan areas with the highest percentages of obese people, eight were among the least likely regions to have easy access to affordable fruits and vegetables. Nine were among the least likely to have a safe place to exercise. Seven were among the most likely to have residents reporting lack of money to buy food in the past 12 months.
Meanwhile, people in the 10 metropolitan areas with the thinnest residents were more likely to say they could find fresh fruits and vegetables, had a safe place to exercise and enough money to buy food.
While an average 77.8 percent of residents in the 10 most obese areas reported having health insurance, 93.6 percent of those in the least obese areas said they had health insurance.
The metropolitan areas with the largest percentages of obese people, according to Gallup:
—Montgomery, Ala. (34.6 percent)
—Stockton, Calif. (34.6 pct)
—Visalia/Porterville, Calif. (34.1 pct)
—York/Hanover, Pa. (34.0 pct)
—Flint, Mich. (33.9 pct)
—McAllen/Edinburg/Mission, Texas (33.7 pct)
—Bakersfield, Calif. (33.6 pct)
—Lynchburg, Va. (33.0 pct)
—Huntington/Ashland, W.Va./Ky./Ohio (33.0 pct)
—Kingsport/Bristol, Tenn./Va. (32.9 pct)
Stockton, Visalia/Porterville and Bakersfield are in a major agricultural region of California. However, they are also poor areas, said Gail Feenstra, food systems coordinator at the Agricultural Sustainability Institute at the University of California, Davis. People with low incomes would have a tough time buying fresh produce in grocery stores, even in regions that grow a lot of fruits and vegetables, she said.
The metropolitan areas with the lowest percentages of obese people, according to Gallup:
—Fort Collins/Loveland, Colo. (16.0 percent)
—Boulder, Colo. (16.6 pct)
—Barnstable Town, Mass. (16.9 pct)
—Colorado Springs, Colo. (17.2 pct)
—San Luis Obispo/Paso Robles, Calif. (17.6 pct)
—Reno/Sparks, Nev. (17.7 pct)
—Santa Cruz/Watsonville, Calif. (17.9 pct)
—San Jose/Sunnyvale/Santa Clara, Calif. (19.0 pct)
—San Francisco/Oakland/Fremont, Calif. (19.2 pct)
—Denver/Aurora, Colo. (19.3 pct)
—Bridgeport/Stamford/Norwalk, Conn. (19.3 pct)
