Overview
- The share of respondents who want meaningful and enjoyable work has fallen to 33%, down from 52% twenty years ago and 39% a decade ago.
- Twenty-two percent now say they want to enjoy life and not exert themselves more than necessary, up from 14% in 2006 and 20% ten years ago.
- Among 18–24-year-olds and singles aged 25–49, pleasure-seekers and the work-focused are roughly balanced at 32% vs 31% and 28% vs 26%, respectively.
- The representative survey questioned 2,000 adults across Germany from November 20 to December 1, 2025.
- The study, commissioned by the BAT Foundation linked to British American Tobacco, is interpreted by Ulrich Reinhardt as reflecting rising desires for stability, self-protection and quality of life in a period of uncertainty and economic pressure.