According to the survey from the Wall Street Journal, 38% of respondents said that patriotism was very important to them, a 32-point decrease from a similar poll conducted in 1998. According to a recent Morning Consult poll, a mere 16% of Generation Z is proud to call themselves American.
The importance attached to having children, a societal necessity, has fallen from 59% in 1998 to 30% in 2023. Only 23% of young adults under the age of 30 responded that having children was very important to them. Seventy-eight percent of respondents did not feel confident that their children would lead better lives than they did.
The value that was once attached to religion has also steeply declined. In 1998, 62% of respondents ranked religion as very important to them. Today, only 39% concur.
A Pew Research Center study from 2022 found that Americans are also leaving Christianity at a steady rate. If this trend continues, 35% of the population could be all that remains by 2070 of the current 64% who identify as Christian.
The poll also revealed that only one value amongst the values surveyed increased in importance to Americans: money. U.S. respondents raised their esteem of money as “very important” from 31% in 1998 to 43% in 2023.