Gen Z men who voted for Trump define success as having children

According to a new NBC poll of 2,970 adults ages 18 to 29, Gen Z men and women are at odds—not just about politics but also on how they’re viewed at work and what it means to be successful. For starters, men approve of Trump’s job performance at a far higher rate than women. A hefty 74% of women disapprove of the job Trump is doing, while only 53% of men in the same age bracket do. The genders were the most divided on Trump’s immigration policies, as 45% of men said they approve, while only 21% of women said the same.

They also have different takes on gender and workplace culture. When asked if gender matters when it comes to getting ahead at work, more than two-thirds of men (69%) said gender doesn’t make a difference. Only about half of women (51%) felt similarly, and 44% of women said it helps to be a man. Only 27% of men answered the same way.

One thing that Gen Zers were thought to be less divided on is their staggering rates of anxiety. Previous studies have shown that Gen Z struggles with anxiety—about work, finances, and the economy. However, according to the new poll, Gen Z women are far more anxious than men. While one-third (33%) of women said they feel anxious about the future “almost all of the time,” only 19% of men said they feel anxious “almost all of the time.” 

And when it comes to ideas about their plans for their future, as well as their views on what makes a successful life, Gen Z men and women are vastly different when examined through a political lens. Overall, they had the same top three answers on what defines success: “having a job or career you find fulfilling,” “having enough money to do the things you want to do,” and “having enough money to do the things you want to do.”

However, when it came to women who voted for Harris versus men who voted for Trump, the answers were strikingly different. While the male Trump voters valued having children as the most important for personal success, the female Harris voters ranked it as the second-least important out of 13 choices, showing perhaps the starkest divide in the entire poll.