By Alex Pabellon, CPA, CGMA

NBC News, citing a survey by Bankrate.com, reported in August 2015 that 56 percent of people aged 18 to 29 have put off major life events (getting married, purchasing a car or home, or saving for retirement) because of student debt. In addition to college debt, the credit bureau Experian finds that millennials have the lowest credit scores of any generation – an average of 625 compared with 650 for members of Gen X and a national average of 667. Millennials also carry as much nonmortgage debt as Gen Xers, but have lower income on average. Many millennials are in their mid-30s and still struggle to compete for professional jobs due to digitization, automation, and commoditization in an increasingly stacked global talent pool. It’s almost as if that piece of the American dream has legs, and it is running away.

My father has a pension. He entered the workforce at a time when 40-year careers with the same company were not uncommon. In his generation, the worker delivered the performance, and the company delivered the stability. I’ve faced job elimination three times due to corporate consolidations. In my generation, job skills cost more, and job security is fleeting or nonexistent. We expect the same types of achievements as our parents, but without the prospect of stability. We’re making bricks without straw.

“Bricks without straw” is a colloquialism that means to attempt to complete a task without the adequate resources. In the American collective consciousness, it has become emblematic of injustice, from the most petty to the most systemic and sobering. Perhaps only some of us are familiar with the story from which the expression originated, but nearly all of us can remember a time when we’ve felt like we were being set up to fail. And we fail until we don’t. Suddenly there’s a paradigm shift, and we somehow learn a way to make bricks that doesn’t require straw.

A paradigm shift is slowly arriving. Here are four things to consider from those millennials who are finding success:

• Everyone is different. Measuring success based on someone else’s achievements (even at the generational level) ignores the different circumstances that affect how success might be defined. For instance, companies are demanding more mobility as temporary and freelance work is requiring a more flexible workforce. Millennials are often more mobile and flexible, which bodes well for meeting the new workforce needs. Success might look very different for each generation.
• Many American homeowners don’t actually “own” their homes: historically, we have had access to 30-year credit and have been federally subsidized "to own a home" via both the mortgage interest and real estate tax deductions. The digital age, new tax laws, and evolving workplace needs are changing the way we think about housing priorities. Renting and other living arrangements are becoming not only more popular, but also possibly even preferable.
• “Less” might be the new “more.” My sister lives in a rowhome in a major city. She doesn’t have a white picket fence, but she enjoys a dramatically lower cost of living. Her property taxes are lower, her mortgage is affordable, and she doesn’t need a car in the city. She was able to pay off her college debt faster and use the surplus to travel and entertain friends – something many of us can only do much later in life. Her “freedom from” the high-cost suburban life that has been considered an American ideal for so long is simply a different version of my “freedom to” get in my car and drive around the country. It’s likely that her version of freedom is actually the more sustainable one. There’s a reason older Americans often downsize during their golden years.
• Many excellent jobs require a skill, not a degree. Heating, plumbing, air conditioning, and lighting are things that everyone (even a high-powered CEO) is absolutely addicted to. There are about 6 million of these good jobs currently open.

Creativity, flexibility, and sustainability may not sound very rugged, but these attributes are proving to be essential for success today. And millennials are using them to solve their 21st century problems.

Alex Pabellon, CPA, CGMA, is manager of accounting policy and SEC reporting at Customers Bancorp in Wyomissing, Pa.