Career Breaks Are the New Luxury for Independent, Gen Z Women

A career break is exactly what it sounds like: the period between when someone quits their job and starts looking for a new one. In this period, people are typically traveling, focusing on themselves, and reflecting on what they really want from their lives. The idea is gaining steam on social media, with hundreds of posts across multiple platforms filled with people discussing its benefits. “I’d never replace the career break I had with anything else,” says TikTok user Cindhwmoon in a video with 10,000 likes, “even though I spent my savings."

For many, career breaks represent a sort of rebellion against a status quo that expects people to prioritize work above all else. In the words of lifestyle influencer Gloryrhodes: “I think the typical notion is like, oh, just grind now and rest later, and I’ve been realizing that I’ve been grinding for a long time. . . At some point, money stopped being the main motivator and being happy took its place.” Where grind culture once dominated the conversation around work, the focus now is on maintaining a healthy work-life balance. “Since COVID-19, people have started to reject hustle culture and pull back,” executive coach Brooks E. Scott told the BBC. “They’re no longer willing to do the work that doesn’t matter, and they’re setting boundaries between themselves and toxic narratives.”

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Career breaks are just one part of a larger shift in the cultural zeitgeist. We’ve seen it in other trends before, like quiet quitting and the “Great Resignation.” People are losing patience for work that doesn’t fulfill them. Most academics suspect this cultural shift is linked to two major factors: COVID-19 and increased economic instability.

COVID-19 made many people realize they didn’t have to spend eight hours a day in an office to get their work done. A 2020 study from Pew Research Center found that around 40% of working adults thought their jobs could be done remotely, and of that percentage, over half said they would prefer to work from home all or most of the time. With COVID-19, people realized that a work-life balance was not only possible, but that it improved the quality of both work and life.

“Workers identified that shorter hours or taking that one-hour lunch break walk helps them get things done,” said Heejung Chung, a professor of sociology and social policy at the University of Kent. “They acknowledged that, yes, they wanted a promotion, but also wanted to spend time with their families.” Randstad’s annual report on work-life in the U.S. found that following COVID-19, “work-life balance” became the highest-ranking factor in employees’ decisions to stay in or pursue a job, even higher than pay or job security.

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In addition to COVID-19, a major cause of the new philosophy toward work is growing cynicism about the state of the economy. In general, when people lose faith in the economy, they have less motivation to prioritize work in their lives—which is exactly what we’re seeing right now. People are more skeptical and distrustful about the economy at the same time as trends focusing on redirecting our energy from work are becoming more popular.

In America, for example, a survey conducted by the Wall Street Journal and NORC Research Center found that only 25% of Americans believed they had a good chance of improving their standard of living. Sixty-nine percent also said that the “American Dream” no longer or never held true. A major source of this cynicism is the ongoing cost-of-living crisis. According to the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development, Americans are working longer hours than the vast majority of developed nations, yet the Ludwig Institute for Shared Economic Prosperity reported that 60% of people are making less than they need to ensure a minimum quality of life.

Most Americans have seen that working hard won’t necessarily improve their finances, so many no longer care about working hard. According to Gallup, in 2024 the percentage of employees engaged at their jobs fell to a new low of 31%. Most people can’t afford the luxury of career breaks, but many are rejecting the idea of a work-centric mindset all the same. In Scott’s words: “Employees are pushing back on hustle culture, stopping doing a bunch of work that doesn’t matter and instead prioritizing their mental health in the workplace.”

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Whether it’s career breaks, quiet quitting, or just emotionally checking out, people are done. They’re done centering their lives on careers that don’t fulfill them, done bending over backward for bosses who don’t pay them enough, and done pretending that their jobs are anything more than an obligation. We’ve entered a new understanding of employment—one where employees prioritize themselves over the needs of the company. Employers will have to either accept that reality or risk becoming obsolete.

by Abigail Hogewood