Ms. Perez’s material goals are relatively modest: She wants to be able to buy a home in a safe neighborhood, invest in stocks and afford trendy sneakers and fancy desserts. Despite this, when it comes to her earning potential, she says, “I don’t have a limit.” She envisions building her business up to a seven-figure income.

These sky-high expectations are in line with those of other members of her generation. In a recent poll, Gen Z-ers on average said that in order to feel financially successful they would need to earn nearly $600,000 a year — or roughly what the top 2 percent of Americans make. Most of the students I spoke to told me they would need $200,000 to $300,000 a year just to feel stable. To be rich, or afford kids, many said they would need millions in the bank. A 2010 Pew survey found that for millennials entering adulthood, marriage and children were far more important than owning a home, earning a lot of money or having free time. While the desire to create a happy family certainly hasn’t disappeared for Gen Z, that value is surpassed in polling data by “financial independence” — having so much wealth you never need to work again.

In some ways, Ms. Perez’s ambitions reminded me of those of a 2010s-era girl boss. But there is a crucial difference: She is not willing to sacrifice her personal life for a company title. Ms. Perez’s fiancé graduated last year and now works as an admissions officer at St. Mary’s. They are getting married next year and hope to have three kids, whom Ms. Perez, a Catholic, wants to raise herself while running her business from home. One of her role models is Lila Rose, a podcaster and anti-abortion activist who is both a high earner and a mother who is present for most of her kids’ waking hours. Young conservative female influencers like Ms. Rose, Brett Cooper and Isabel Brown bring their children on work trips and hold their newborns in video interviews, conspicuously displaying a lifestyle that balances faith, family and financial comfort. It’s a version of having it all for the influencer generation — and a response to economic scarcity by doubling down on personal choices.

Ms. Perez looks at her peers with alarm, and not because she worries about unemployment rates. “It’s like there’s no motivation,” she says. Others I spoke to levied similar judgments. Adreanna Marin, a 39-year-old aspiring social worker at California State University, San Marcos, who first started college 20 years ago, told me, “It almost seems like ambition is no longer existent, honestly, among college students.” Many students blamed smartphones, the boogeyman of our age. “We are the future, and we can change it,” Jaasiel Hernandez, 20, an engineering student at Porterville College in California, said. “But it’s easier to sit down and scroll.” His comment echoed a common fear: If you live on autopilot, you’ll turn 30 in your parents’ basement, unemployed, in debt and glued to your feed.