In the United Kingdom, there is evidence to support the idea of an intergenerational wealth divide between older generations, in particular the baby boomers who were born between 1946 and 1964 and the millennials who were born roughly between 1981 and 1996. A report from the International Longevity Centre (ILC) UK cited data from 2010 to 2020 that indicated a disproportionate increase in wealth between the two generations, such that people aged 55 and up saw their wealth increase by at least 39% while those aged 35 to 44 only saw their wealth increase by 4% (“Intergenerational inequality and the future of the social contract.” International Longevity Centre UK, Nov. 2024). One of the clear manifestations of this divide can be seen in the national property market, which transformed modestly purchased homes into extraordinary reservoirs of unearned wealth over several decades. Boomers who bought in areas like Notting Hill or Balham in the 1980s and 1990s watched those properties multiply in value, such that the average value of household wealth had grown seven times its value in the 1980s by the start of the COVID-19 pandemic (Savage, Michael. “Middle class millennials set to gain most from ‘unprecedented’ wealth transfer.” The Guardian, 16 Nov. 2024.) Conversely, these properties fell far outside the earning range of new workers, even if they were earning equivalent rates for equivalent professional work as their older peers. 

Even the expansion of business and financial opportunities, like the burgeoning gig market, does little in the way of alleviating economic burden, as the average UK worker would still require over a lifetime of earnings to match the wealthiest 10% of the country (Stewart, Heather. “Lifetime of earnings not enough for UK workers to join wealthiest 10%, report says.” The Guardian, 8 Oct. 2025). The result is a structural exclusion: younger generations, doing equivalent professional work, cannot access the same neighborhoods their parents purchased cheaply. The same ILC report revealed that young adults and adults aged 25-49 had the strongest appetite towards putting their money into housing compared to their older peers, who indicated they would prioritize their money towards savings and other costs like existing loans or holiday expenses. 

This tension is the economic engine of Look What You Made Me Do. Late baby boomers Kate and Jack inhabit a technology-enhanced smart home in west London. Their dinner guests include a couple in Notting Hill who have knocked two terraced houses together into a single showpiece property. When Kate observes that there is no way the guests’ salaries could sustain an address in that part of town, concluding that “there must be private money somewhere in the background” (9), she is identifying the very mechanism researchers at the Resolution Foundation have described as a growing reliance on inherited wealth to underwrite middle-class life (Leslie, Jack, & Shah, Krishan. “Intergenerational rapport fair? Intergenerational wealth transfers and the effect on UK families.” The Resolution Foundation, 3 Feb. 2022.) Meanwhile, Phoebe, the millennial antagonist, occupies a maisonette in Acton and articulates a generational fury at boomers sitting on “the great sofa of baby boomer entitlement and economic good fortune” (15). Her grievance is not merely personal. The novel’s architects discuss how rising stamp duty has made renovation preferable to moving, funneling wealth into existing properties rather than expanding access. This structural stasis, in which the comfortable consolidate and the young are locked out, gives the novel’s class resentments their credible and urgent economic foundation.