You Beta, You Beta, You Bet

Since this trend began a few years ago when media outlets started reporting on the work habits of younger generations, every generation seems to have less work ethic and more animosity towards our amazing capitalist system than the one before. The situation has only gotten worse as productivity and worker engagement has been spiralling steadily downward. The year 2020 marked the first time in history that youthful workers began feeling unfulfilled with the idea of spending their entire life laboring. While it’s been objectively reported for years that nobody wants to work anymore, it appears this latest generation doesn't want to work even less anymore.

While the habits of Millennials, Zoomers, and Gen Alpha have been exhaustively covered, a new generation has joined the fray: Generation Beta, named by demographer Mark McCrindle who defines this new cohort as “the chronological successor to Generation Alpha”.

Some people who already have experience with members of Gen Beta, also known as “Genbies” by business reporters looking to save time on typing, have so far been unimpressed.

“You know how Gen Alpha had Skibiti Toilet?” says work-from-home sales rep Damien Gordon. “Well these new kids don’t use the toilet at all!”

Gordon has found himself in a supervisory role over a new Genby in his workplace.

“Seriously,” he says, “this kid has been here almost a month now and has never even tried to use the bathroom, not even once! He just goes wherever he happens to be lying, and lying around is about all he does. I thought maybe they'd be like those people that wear diapers so they can work long hours without breaks, but no! They wear the diapers and still don't do a damn thing!

“And don’t get me started about what this kid is into,” adds Gordon. “I swear, completely obsessed with tits.”

Jennifer Pacheco is a Day Care worker who reports similar experiences as several Genbies and those close to Genby age have recently entered her workplace as well.

“I really don’t understand their trends like at all,” reports Pacheco. “All they ever wanna do is shake their little fidget toys, do their viral tummy-time trends, and talk in gibberish. I mean, I know we all used slang in our day, but I cannot understand the noises coming out of these kids’ mouths!”

While the lack of motivation to work (or even roll over on their own for that matter) isn’t surprising given the trend constantly forced onto our social media news feeds, some are worried that Genbies may be the most radically anti-capitalist generation ever, and not just because we’re going to report it with that slant and force the story onto your news feed.

An example of this can be seen in how Genbies have disrupted the retail environment. If you speak to any customer service worker they’ll tell you that not a day goes by that some angry or fussy Genby doesn’t interrupt their day with their screaming, probably signalling that they’re not all happy with the current state of consumerism.

While Genbies would call this “hissy-maxxing” or something like that, The National Retail Federation (NRF) refers to it as “Organized Retail Tantrums” (or ORT) and speculate it costs them millions a year somehow.

David Johnston, NRF’s Vice President for Asset Protection says on this issue: “Since Gen Beta has entered our stores, we’ve seen an increase in shrink losses of 47%. How those two things are related and how we got to those numbers can be found in our annual Loss Report which we recently decided not to release to the public.”

Their penchant for anarchy notwithstanding, some theorize that Genbies may yet find their place in the bastion of democracy that is the American two-party system.

“All they do all day is cry and piss their pants?” asks conservative YouTuber Derek Viceroy. “Sound like a bunch of libs to me!”

“I don't know, they seem fairly conservative” says liberal influencer Denise Birdbath on BlueSky, “the way they scream until they're red in the face and who the hell even knows about what, like they're screaming just to scream.”

But with an economy already teetering on the brink due to lazy, young workers and no other reason (the corporation who owns this publication told me I had to say that and put that last part in bold), we have to wonder if we can even abide a generation who just wants to lay around, play silly games, and cry to get what they want. But like it or not, Generation Beta will soon be entering the workforce. The only question remaining is how to get them (and everyone else) to not to be such babies about it.