11/11/2025
The Donkey Economy
How Quick Delivery Apps Are Stealing Our Youth’s Future
By Jitendra Nayak
31.October.2025
The rate at which quick delivery apps are expanding today Zepto, Swiggy Instamart, Blinkit, Dunzo, you name it is astonishing. They’ve transformed convenience into a culture. But beneath this shiny surface of instant gratification lies a silent tragedy that few are talking about.
Look closer, and you’ll see an entire generation of young people aged between 20 and 28 caught in a cycle that looks deceptively lucrative but dangerously hollow. These boys and girls, many earning what seems like “good money” for their age, are unknowingly trading the most formative years of their life for short-term comfort.
This is the time when they should be learning skills real, tangible, life-sustaining skills. They could have been mechanics, electricians, plumbers, carpenters, or machine operators. They could have worked in workshops, on factory floors, or with skilled tradesmen, learning how to create, repair, and build. These are professions that would have given them stability, self-worth, and a respected place in society as they grow older.
Instead, they’re becoming what I can only describe as modern-day donkeys tireless, directionless, and replaceable.
I say this with a vivid memory from my childhood. My father was in the construction business, and I remember seeing donkeys being used on sites. Their job was simple and repetitive: carry sand or cement on their backs from one point to another, unload it, and walk back again. The owner would earn from this endless loop of mechanical movement.
Now, when I see delivery riders zooming around town, I see no difference.
They are the new donkeys of our age burdened by bags instead of baskets, guided not by whips but by app notifications. They race from one pickup point to another, eyes glued to GPS screens, delivering someone’s order within ten minutes again and again, all day, every day.
There’s no learning, no growth, no exposure just movement.
And this movement, mistaken for progress, is the most dangerous illusion of our times.
What happens when these young men turn 30 or 35? The fatigue will set in. Their bodies will ache, their minds will tire, and worst of all, they will realize they have no transferable skill, no craft, no profession. Their earning power will decline just when responsibilities rise.
And then what?
AI, robotics, or automation will not save them. These are human beings, not algorithms. When the body slows down and the mind finds no direction, life becomes survival not living.
This isn’t just an economic concern; it’s a social one.
Every society needs its skilled workforce plumbers, electricians, painters, mechanics, masons, and carpenters people who build and repair the physical world we live in. But with each passing year, fewer youngsters are entering these trades. They are getting lost in the illusion of quick cash and easy freedom.
If this continues, the future will face a strange paradox a country with millions of young people but a shortage of skilled hands.
It’s time we speak about this honestly.
Parents, educators, and community leaders must remind the youth: earning early is not the same as building a career.
Money without skill is temporary. But skill once learned becomes a lifelong companion.
So if you’re young and reading this, step off the treadmill of endless deliveries.
Learn something real.
Build something.
Fix something.
Make something that outlives your shift.
That’s how you’ll truly deliver not food, not groceries, but a future
