Today's Generation - Lazy, or simply clueless?

The video we watched on the first day of class about today's generation and our lack of work ethic really interested me. This is a problem that I have heard many older people complain about for some time now. I am conflicted with these thoughts. Part of me feels as though we don't have the work ethic that our grandparents and great-grandparents had, simply because they had to do more just to get by. In the days when children were expected to work in the fields and provide for themselves as early as possible, they had no choice but to work hard. In today's society, we depend on others for a much longer time and we are not forced to provide for ourselves until much later in life. Perhaps it is for this reason that we seem to not have enough work ethic. It simply is not required of us. If more was required of us to simply get by and survive, then I am sure that all of us would be doing as much as we could to survive. Now, at a young age, surviving does not require much of us. Our grandparents and those before them, who had to work hard to get by when they were young, are now the ones working hard to take care of us. They have been working hard their whole life, whether it is for themselves or not. This explains why they think we do not have enough work ethic - they are constant hard workers because it is required of them.
Another part of me thinks that it is our fault that we do not have enough work ethic because we have allowed ourselves to get used to having things handed to us. An example that comes to my mind is my cousin, a 30-year-old college graduate with a Business degree. He is now working for his mom (my aunt) because she is the only person that will hire him. Since the time he graduated college nearly 8 years ago, he has not been able to hold a steady job for any amount of time, because he expects his job to cater to him. He wants to be able to sleep late, come in at 10:00, take a 2-hour lunch break, leave early, and call his wife whenever he wants during the day. His wife doesn't help the matter, in that she wants to call him all day, and wants him to come home and help her clean the house and take care of their children. He has been fired from countless jobs over the last few years because he doesn't understand that working doesn't mean doing what you want, and doesn't necessarily mean doing things that would be normal for you. You are getting paid to do a job, so while you are working, you should be expected to do your best and do what is expected of you. His whole life, he has just had stuff handed to him and expects that he should be able to do whatever he wants wherever he works. The idea of enjoying your work and having fun is a great idea - I agree with it whole-heartedly. I believe that a happy employee is a productive employee. However, this only works if the employee is actually productive in being happy and enjoying their job. It is when people take advantage of this idea of happiness that it becomes a problem. Unfortunately, I think this is the way too much of our generation is; we are used to having things handed to us, and so many of us are simply clueless about what should be expected of us in a professional atmosphere. We expect that we should have fun and enjoy ourselves everywhere we are at and in whatever we are doing. As long as we have this kind of mindset, older generations looking in on us will always see us as lazy and lacking any kind of work ethic.