Gen Z employees are stressed, depressed, and burnt out: Study

A new study paints a bleak picture of Gen Z workers’ state of mind.

MetLife (MET-1.09%) released some early findings from its 2025 Employee Benefit Trends Study and found that less than one in three Gen Z employees feel holistically healthy, meaning they don’t think they have decent mental, financial, social and physical health.

Just 31% said they feel holistically healthy compared to the 42% of workers overall. Boomers reported being the most holistically healthy at 57%, compared to 41% for both Millennials and Gen X.

On average, Gen Z said they feel more depressed, stressed, burnt out, and isolated than their counterparts. Twenty percent of workers overall reported feeling depressed — and that number jumped to 35% for Gen Z.

When MetLife compared their findings to workers aged 21-25 surveyed in 2018, Gen Z employees today feel 5% less successful, 8% less happy, 8% less engaged, 11% more stressed and 9% more overwhelmed than their counterparts seven years ago.

Gen Z also reported feeling eight percent less financially healthy than the average employee, with particular concern about saving for life expenses, housing, and high interest rates.