It something that my work colleagues talk about. They would be in the late 50, early 60s. They are grandparents as well, they had their share of raising their kids. Personally I do not have kids so I cannot say much about it.
Then that would be a case of generational differences.
Every generation thinks that their children's generation is lazy and or otherwise lacking in certain qualities. Then their children grow up to become actual independent adults and then they realize that is (generally) not the case.
My father is in his late 50s. He worked 12-14hr+ days throughout his younger working years. He was part of the post-war generation in Korea that believed in the ideology that they must sacrifice themselves for the betterment of their country.
You know what's the funny part? My grandfather considered my father lazy and good for nothing. You know why? Because he studied and otherwise acted as a student and a young adult (with all the implications that follows) instead of helping out at the family store in his early 20s. And because he failed the college entrance exams and had to go to the Korean equivalent of a community college instead of a full-fledged university.
Now he works at one of the largest semiconductor companies in the world and makes an embarrassingly large amount of money.
In short- the qualities you have in your youth and how you act then do not mean much in comparison to how you act in your adulthood.
This doesn't actually have much to do with the real issue embodied by the "everyone is a winner!" mentality going around today. Could it lead to idiotic people who are self-indulgent and think they deserve more than they really do? Yes, of course. I know that this trend is only really just starting and it will be the later generations that we'll have to keep an eye on.
But taking what older folks say about the younger folks as simple truth is misleading. The older generation generally thinks poorly of the younger generation. Parents tend to see all the flaws of their children and none of their virtues.
But I've yet to meet any of those "I deserve everything!" people that supposedly exist, and until I meet them i'll simply consider it just the older generation doing what they are wont to do.