“People just want to be able to afford the basics and not feel like they’re going to have a panic attack when they’re buying milk, bread and eggs at the store.”
That’s from a 25-year-old in Sydney, quoted in a recent Centre for Independent Studies report. The same study found that two-thirds of young Australians think it’s harder to get ahead now; and nearly half worry about their future.
The research also confirmed that a sense of control over one’s life is central to satisfaction; but only one in ten young people believes they have any control over their real-life barriers.
That’s why I walked away from a career in banking to do what I do now.
I have three Gen Z kids. I watch them and their peers navigate a landscape that is so different from the one I grew up in. The career escalator that my generation stepped onto out of education doesn’t exist. Instead, it’s more like a river of change, with stepping stones that sometimes shift or wash away even as you’re crossing. People are linking together jobs, gigs, side hustles and projects to construct careers in ways I never had to.
And money sits right in the middle. Not just as a practical problem but an emotional one. Getting it wrong has real consequences for life, family, plans. Most people carry that weight themselves, compounded by a feeling that they should probably be doing more but aren’t.
And what help do they get?
We all know the answer to that. For years, we’ve all built better and better tools for customers. Better apps, better dashboards, better charts. They’re often really good. But they all share the same assumption: here’s your information, now figure out what to do with it.
None of that gets to the heart of the issue. People don’t need another dashboard. Nobody wants to be a spreadsheet guru (no disrespect to pivot table lovers).
There is now a genuine technology able to do something about this. And I don’t mean a new batch of fintech tools. I mean something far more significant: a fundamental shift in what technology can do for people. AI that can understand context, spot patterns, plainly explain what matters and help you make better decisions. Not generate a chart; do the thinking.
So we’re building Lucie Money: a personal money agent that watches over your finances, tells you what matters and helps you act. Not a dashboard you check; something that does the checking for you.
It’s about giving people a sense of control. The confidence to lift their heads up from worrying about money, because they know it’s in hand. So they can see what’s around them. Grasp opportunities that might otherwise pass by.
A chance for people to build futures on confidence rather than anxiety.
We’re building Lucie now and targeting launch in Australia later this year. I’d love to hear from you or have you follow along. There’s a waitlist at lucie.money.