Millennials, precarity and the fracturing geography of urban citizenship

Access to secure jobs through regulated employment and secure housing through home ownership were key elements of Australia’s, and many other countries’ model of social citizenship in post World War Two decades. Recently, we have witnessed the emergence of the so-called ‘precariat’, people in ‘non-standard’ insecure, flexible, and lower paid employment for segments of the workforce, particularly the young. In parallel, home ownership pathways for recent generations have faltered, seeing the emergence of ‘generation rent’ and a greater reliance on family wealth to support the transition into homeownership, giving rise to an increased precarity in the life trajectories of Millennials. However, little contemporary urban research has analysed the way three intersecting intergenerational changes in housing opportunities, employment conditions and family circumstances of Millennials have played out across the contemporary city. This paper presents an analysis of a 2021 census-based measures of precarity of 25–39 year-olds across Australia’s two largest cities, Sydney and Melbourne. Mapping of five distinct clusters show how the post-war ‘suburban settlement’ of widespread suburban homeownership, is being replaced by a new socio-spatial structure, reflecting the emergent ways employment status, housing market restructuring, familial factors and immigrant status intersect, forming the basis of new urban cleavages.