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I'm sorry but if you can't retire because you are supporting a 40 yr old who can't find/hold a job, something went wrong long ago. That is not the same thing as a recent grad living at home and looking for work or working and saving money for a downpayment on a house and/or paying down student loans while helping out around the house. Not even remotely the same thing.
I don't think the OP post is really about the very recent grad who comes home right after graduation and starts looking for a job immediately.
It's about the ones who are still there months later, even a year later when the next batch of grads is coming out, but they still haven't found a way to support themselves.
Again -- I don't think there has ever been a time in history when so many over 25 year olds are still living in their parents' home.
Again -- I don't think there has ever been a time in history when so many over 25 year olds are still living in their parents' home.
Goals change. Society changes.
The idea of having financial security/money in the bank was unheard of when I was in my 20's. (I'm a Boomer.) Most left home at 18, to serve during Vietnam, or after college graduation. Like the day after. NO ONE in my circle was hanging around the house saving up money to get a house. People didn't even save up for first and last month's rent. You just got more roommates or lived in a scummier place. We left home with little or nothing in the bank and no one expected to live in a condo with a pool and a gym and a place full of electronic toys. Whatever. Things change.
You can't apply standards from 40 years ago to the way people live now.
^^Just re-read the OP. One example he gives is of a recent high school grad who says he isn't looking for a job this summer b/c he's leaving in August. My DD had the same situation the year she graduated from high school. She's soon to be 26 and she is neither living at home or under a bridge. If he doesn't have a job by now, he's not going to find someone to hire him for barely over 2 months. The other ex he gives is of a 25 yo.
Again -- I don't think there has ever been a time in history when so many over 25 year olds are still living in their parents' home.
Well, you would be wrong, but only because the circumstances of being able to live in one's own home drastically changed in the industrial age. For much of our history, adult children stayed at home to work on the family farm, for example. Multigenerational households were the norm in other countries as well.
In 1900, roughly one-third of white men aged twenty-five were living at home with their parents—two and a half times the share in 1970.7 By 2000, the share living at home was one-fifth; by 2007, it had increased to one-fourth. Since the 1970s, black men have lived more often with parents than their white peers at both ages twenty-five and thirty. Figures 1 and 2 show that during this period women have tended to leave home earlier than men, and, as we show later, cohabit or marry earlier as well.
Quote:
To leave home quickly in the 1950s was "normal" because opportunities were plentiful and social expectations of the time reinforced the need to do so. At the turn of both the twentieth and twenty-first centuries, greater proportions of young people stayed at home longer than those who came of age at mid-century because they faced distinctive social and economic conditions of their own.
Well, you would be wrong, but only because the circumstances of being able to live in one's own home drastically changed in the industrial age. For much of our history, adult children stayed at home to work on the family farm, for example. Multigenerational households were the norm in other countries as well.
Previous generations also married younger and typically - though not always - moved out at that point. College educated young people could ifteb expect to land a job with a company offering a defined benefit retirement plan and took that job expecting to remain with that company their entire career. Those who went to work right out of high school often went into an apprenticeship of some type or into a factory or similar type job where again, they could expect to work their entire career. Medical insurance was not the norm either - but then neither were medical bills into the millions if one became seriously ill. As medical care and availability have improved so have the costs for both.
A lot of things change with each generation - I don't see why there is an issue with adult children either living at home or moving out. The key is whether it is mutually agreeable and beneficial.
However, I do recognize that some adult children are lazy, unmotiviated, moochers and I think the school of hard-knocks is necessary to get them to understand that those traits will get you no where fast. I have seen adult kids take advantage of their parents and I think that type of dysfunctional relationship should be criticized. If the relationship is functional and mutually respectful that's one thing, but, codependent parents and their self-centered, mooching kids is another.
^^This. I believe those of us who frown upon adult children returning home are speaking of the situation you've described above. I know I am and I know some who fit this role to a T!
I'm glad for that. I didn't mean to imply that there are no jobs at all in art history. Ironically, my conversation with the art history Ph.D. took place in 2006, the same year your daughter graduated. This person taught art history at a small private college in the southeast and she told me of situations where there were hundreds of applicants for an available job, and she told me she was speaking of museum jobs as well as teaching jobs.
Your daughter must have impeccable credentials, recommendations, and interviewing skills. Do you know how many applicants there were for the jobs she landed? By the way, I have been to the Autry Center.
Whether I overstated the case in my post I'm not sure because I'm not an insider in this field, but I think it's fairly clear that it is a crowded field at the very least, so it would be prudent for art history majors to have a "plan B".
Thanks for posting; it's good to hear of happy endings.
My daughter always knew she didn't want to teach, so she wouldn't pursue an art history PhD. She had to start at the Autry part time in membership, which wasn't what she wanted, but she took it to get a foot in the door. She had a solid GPA, not what I would call outstanding though, but she did do an unpaid internship at the LA County Museum while she was working part time at the Autry. She was never one to let grass grow under her feet. I would say though that she comes off as friendly, offbeat and optimistic about most things. She would never be someone who would rub someone the wrong way.
I don't see why there is an issue with adult children either living at home or moving out. The key is whether it is mutually agreeable and beneficial.
"Beneficial" is hard to define and pin down. I agree that an adult child who is living at home but working and saving up for a house and/or paying off student loans and at the same time making some contribution to household expenses, even a modest one, in in a "mutually beneficial" situation. No issue there.
But the "mutually agreeable" part is tricky. Let us posit a free-loading, mooching situation (adult child is not employed or doing anything constuctive). That could be mutually agreeable if the parent has skewed values and an infantile need for the continued close proximity of the adult child. I would have an issue with that because the child is being cheated out of becoming a productive, autonomous adult. There is a pride of achievement which is missing for that child, and I think it's sad. I know of one case where it continued for a lifetime and another case where the jury is still out.
Key word here is "enabling". I can completely understand the 18/19 year old who lives with their parents while working/taking classes, etc. In most cases I would assume they are preparing for their future and independance.
But I think the people OP is referring to are people like my 30 y/o brother in law. Talk about enabling. He graduated a year ago with a Bachelors (finally). His parents pay for:
Rent for he and his girlfriend
His pet's vet bills/ necessities
Car repairs
Car which was provided by them
Car insurance
Gas
Utilities
Groceries
Out of pocket monthly health insurance plan
Iphone bill
Spending money
Gym/tanning membership
He is THIRTY. He only works part time, claims he cant get more hours. He parties all night, sleeps in til noon. Is picky about job openings (didnt want a certain internship because it *only* paid $20k a year). Entitled, enabled, lazy. Pathetic. Socially he is on a high schoolers level. I shudder at the thought of a potential employer looking at his Facebook page.
The sad thing is, his parents have allowed this to continue on and on and on. They drop everything for him, treat him like a king even though he gives no respect, yet they demand none either. They have not allowed him to grow as a person, as a man, which I personally think is really sad that his parents do this to fulfill THEIR needs.
"Beneficial" is hard to define and pin down. I agree that an adult child who is living at home but working and saving up for a house and/or paying off student loans and at the same time making some contribution to household expenses, even a modest one, in in a "mutually beneficial" situation. No issue there.
But the "mutually agreeable" part is tricky. Let us posit a free-loading, mooching situation (adult child is not employed or doing anything constuctive). That could be mutually agreeable if the parent has skewed values and an infantile need for the continued close proximity of the adult child. I would have an issue with that because the child is being cheated out of becoming a productive, autonomous adult. There is a pride of achievement which is missing for that child, and I think it's sad. I know of one case where it continued for a lifetime and another case where the jury is still out.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Copsgirl73
Key word here is "enabling". I can completely understand the 18/19 year old who lives with their parents while working/taking classes, etc. In most cases I would assume they are preparing for their future and independance.
But I think the people OP is referring to are people like my 30 y/o brother in law. Talk about enabling. He graduated a year ago with a Bachelors (finally). His parents pay for:
Rent for he and his girlfriend
His pet's vet bills/ necessities
Car repairs
Car which was provided by them
Car insurance
Gas
Utilities
Groceries
Out of pocket monthly health insurance plan
Iphone bill
Spending money
Gym/tanning membership
He is THIRTY. He only works part time, claims he cant get more hours. He parties all night, sleeps in til noon. Is picky about job openings (didnt want a certain internship because it *only* paid $20k a year). Entitled, enabled, lazy. Pathetic. Socially he is on a high schoolers level. I shudder at the thought of a potential employer looking at his Facebook page.
The sad thing is, his parents have allowed this to continue on and on and on. They drop everything for him, treat him like a king even though he gives no respect, yet they demand none either. They have not allowed him to grow as a person, as a man, which I personally think is really sad that his parents do this to fulfill THEIR needs.
Well clearly there are those who mooch. And parents who are somehow validated by it. I don't think that's anything new. I used to hear about that kind of thing from coworkers years and years ago. I think what people are objecting to is the posters who insist that allowing an adult child to live at home under any circumstance is "coddling" or spoiling them - that they won't know how to survive if they haven't had to claw, tooth and nail for every penny. I think that most parents and children fall somewhere in between, in a relatively healthy "zone" of acceptable assistance.
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