“If you proletarianize young people, don't be surprised when they become communists”
Thiel interprets the rise of socialist Zohran Mamdani, the new mayor of New York, as a logical consequence of the collapse of the intergenerational pact and that young people have become the big losers of late capitalism.
“If you proletarianize young people, don't be surprised when they become communists,” he states.
In his analysis, housing has become the main vector of inequality. The businessman denounces that restrictive urban planning laws and real estate interests have “shielded” cities for the wealthiest generations, while young people are expelled from the market.
That same fracture, he warns, is replicated in higher education: “Too many people go to college, learn nothing, and end up with overwhelming debt.”
Thiel recalls that more than a decade ago, with his Thiel Fellowship, he already warned of the risk of turning university into a debt and frustration machine.
Now, he assures, that model “has definitively exploded”: young people feel trapped, stuck in precarious jobs and inaccessible housing, and the system responds with “more rhetoric and fewer solutions.”
Mamdani and the politics of frustration
The rise of 33-year-old socialist Zohran Mamdani, the new mayor of New York, has become a symptom of structural change for Thiel.
“When 70% of millennials say they are pro-socialist, you have to try to understand why,” he states. The businessman avoids demonizing the youth vote: he believes the phenomenon responds less to ideology than to a feeling of life blockage.
For him, Mamdani's victory symbolizes a generational break: young people “don't aspire to get rich,” but simply “to be able to live.”
Although he criticizes the solutions proposed by the new mayor – whom he calls a “democratic Marxist” – he admits that “at least he is talking about the problems that the rest of the politicians prefer to ignore.”
Thiel maintains that the American left “offers wrong answers to real questions,” while the right “continues to act as if everything is working well.”
“It would be healthy if fewer people voted in elections”
Beyond the economic, the investor denounces the hyper-politicization of modern society.
“It would be healthy if we had elections where fewer people voted,” he states. “If everything worked well, politics would matter less.”
For Thiel, the obsession with politics is a reflection of a loss of faith in institutions and the real economy. “When the system works – he suggests – people don’t need to live waiting for the next electoral cycle.”
In his opinion, Western democracies have become addicted to political conflict and every election is experienced “like a cultural civil war.”
The businessman compares this tension to financial markets: “We are in a bull market for politics,” he explains. “Everyone believes their vote can change everything, and that is not healthy.”
“Capitalism no longer works for young people”
The most forceful statement of the interview summarizes his diagnosis: “Capitalism is not working for young people.”
Thiel describes a system that “only benefits the elderly and property owners,” where wages do not cover the cost of living and credit has become the new form of dependence.
Collapse of social pact and revolution
He warns that the current economic model has broken the contract between generations: the “baby boomers” accumulated wealth and property, while millennials inherit an uncertain future.
“The boomers promised too much to themselves and their children, and now the numbers no longer add up,” he points out. In his opinion, the collapse of that social pact explains political radicalization: “When people cannot improve their lives by economic means, they start looking for it in ideology.”
With his usual provocative tone, Thiel concludes the interview with a paradox: “Revolution now means 70-year-old grandmothers, not angry young people.”
According to the investor, the transformative energy of youth has been absorbed by an aging system, where the elderly control both the economy and political discourse.
He maintains that real social change will not come from technological elites or traditional politics, but from a complete rethinking of the economy of work, housing, and education.