There are few things more dangerous on the internet right now than a podcast clip featuring a finance bro, a microphone, and a terrifying number flashing across the screen. This month’s contribution to the growing list of modern anxieties came from Sandeep Jethwani, co-founder of Dezerv, who claimed that urban Indians spending ₹1 lakh to ₹2 lakh a month today will need a retirement corpus of ₹40 crore by the age of 60.
Naturally, it sent everyone on social media into a financial spiral. Some called the number ridiculous. Others panic-refreshed their bank balance at 1 am. But interestingly, most Gen Zers we spoke to did not feel stumped. Because if there is one thing young Indians already know, it is that existing has become wildly expensive. A grocery run can set you back with an EMI, and attending a concert with your partner can often need a financial planning call with the family. So, while ₹40 crore definitely sounds like a retirement plan designed for the top one percent, the larger logic underneath it still feels believable. Stability has become expensive.
Retirement anxiety has been brewing online for a while now. Last year, an HSBC report claimed affluent Indians would need around ₹3.5 crore to retire comfortably while also calling India one of the cheapest places in the world to retire. Which is comforting news if you happen to just have “spare crores” lying around. Around the same time, a Grant Thornton Bharat survey found that nearly 43 per cent of Indians under 25 want to retire before 55, proving that corporate burnout now arrives before back pain.
Then there is the FIRE (Financial Independence Retire Early) movement, which has become wildly popular among young professionals trying to escape the 9-to-5 through side hustles, passive income, and aggressive SIP planning. The movement built around aggressive savings, investment, and frugality is luring everyone with a simple dream: Retire by 40 and spend your life drinking overpriced coffee somewhere scenic. The only problem is that reality (and matcha’s rising cost) keeps ruining the fantasy.
There is a growing online community championing quitting work long before you hit your sixties, but Gen Z, already careful with finances unlike the previous generation, isn’t buying the idea of leaving the daily grind well ahead of their twilight years. Some creatives, like Akshit Arora, a 28-year-old graphic designer from Mumbai, who currently lives paycheck to paycheck, have already made peace with never really retiring: “This number is mindboggling [for a creative like me],” he says, “But I love what I am doing and I’d like to one day have my own home/studio and if that means I may never retire then so be it.”
Others have taken it in their stride in a way you can only expect from a generation that has grown up with irony and their signature stare. Suhani Singh, a 22-year-old financial marketing analyst at Futures First in Gurugram, laughs resignedly, “The ₹40 crore figure sounds outrageous until we realise inflation also has career goals.” According to Singh, the number feels achievable for people working in high-paying sectors like finance, consulting and tech, which perhaps explains why so many young people are quietly choosing careers based less on passion and more on survival.
For years, Indian kids who wanted to become writers, designers or filmmakers usually had to deliver TED Talk-level presentations to convince their parents they would not starve. But now, Gen Z seems to be rejecting passion on its own before anyone even tells them to. Earlier this year, finance creator Nitin Kaushik went viral for saying “passion doesn’t pay EMIs”, and honestly, the current economy seems determined to prove him right.
Unlike boomers who were sold the dream of joining one company, buying a house at 30, and retiring peacefully at 60 with matching recliner chairs and a pension, younger Indians are already assuming they may have to work well into their seventies. So, instead of obsessing over one grand retirement, they are increasingly romanticising what they call “mini-retirements”, aka tiny breaks from capitalism, to stop themselves from completely losing their minds. Arora’s own strategy is perhaps the most relatable one of all. “Ditch my taste for Diet Cokes and probably ask my finance-bro friends to help me plan my money better,” he laughs. “No, but really I am planning on taking a sabbatical every few years to stop myself from going crazy.”
And then there are the gigmaxxers, the people building side hustles or multiple career paths because one income stream no longer feels enough. Shradha Padukone, a 25-year-old business analyst at EY in Kochi, agrees with the ₹40 crore guesstimate. “Have you seen how expensive everything is now? There are plenty of people out there who are earning more than ₹40 crores,” she says. Her own target is “way over 40 crores”. But despite her stable corporate job, Padukone is already looking at content creation as her side hustle: “You can earn lakhs for a video once you make it big,” she explains.
You see her point. Padukone, like others of her generation, grew up watching creators build entire businesses out of bedrooms, coffee shops, and ring lights. Somewhere between GRWM videos, brand deals and aesthetic morning routines, influencing stopped looking like internet vanity and started looking like a legitimate career graph.
Like her, Kavya V, a senior events specialist from Bengaluru, who has worked with clients like Microsoft and IBM, is relying on side hustles to take her through life. “I’m 27 and I still feel like I’ve barely travelled or bought things I genuinely want because so much money goes into just surviving in Tier-1 cities and supporting loved ones,” she complains. Instead of chasing retirement, she’s currently building an art-based side hustle alongside her current job via social media to beat the rising costs of living in the near future.
Of course, hanging over all of this is AI, lurking in the background like a villain in a Black Mirror episode. Finance professionals are worried about automation. Creatives are worried about AI-generated art replacing entry-level jobs. Everyone feels vaguely replaceable all the time, which probably explains why Gen Z is obsessed with backup plans, side hustles, and multiple income streams.
Writer and chartered accountant Lavanya Mohan believes the internet’s obsession with giant retirement numbers needs context. “A lot of this is engineered for people to kind of come to this expert for advice,” she says. “It’s like ‘I will tell you you are doomed and then I will save you.’” According to Mohan, the author of Money Doesn’t Grow on Trees, Gen Z is also approaching retirement very differently from older generations. “I definitely think this is a generation that wouldn’t just retire,” she says.
Her advice is refreshingly simple. Get health insurance early. Stop comparing your real life to people on Instagram vacationing in Bali every three business days. And maybe stop assuming everyone else has life figured out. “A lot of behaviours we see on social media are not normal,” she says. “Because we see so much of it online, we think it’s normal. Just do your best and ignore all the noise around you. I promise you’ll be fine.”
