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Krichton good points kids are already in debt. Student loans are a killer for many. I myself called grad school a day debt being a major reason. Average student loan debt now is like 23k. If a kid does not call it a day at a BA. Then the number rises overall to 40 to 60k total. Grad school is many times all loans. My program gave 3 full rides and a few TA'S maybe 5 that was it. It had 100's in the program. Everybody else it was loans. A state U were not talking Yale here. I was working on MA in education not eastern Art or something. The aid is just not there like it use to be. And the cost keeps going up. I had some friends who were dirt poor they still ended up with student loans. Lots of grants cheap college cost those are things of the past. I was on the bus not long ago. My driver was telling me her DD had worked 6 days in the last 3 weeks. She was 20 and had been at the same fast food job 3 years. She was a high school grad. So what does she do now? Go to college ring up some student loans? What if that does not work out? Now she has debts she can not get rid of. She will still be back home with mom at the end of the day. We have way more competition then we ever had. The job market is flooded with college grads. The colleges keep pumping out college grads. But their are not enough jobs for everyone. We are dealing with global competition college educated workers who can work for 10k to 15k. This is a good wage in India or China lots of entry levle jobs have went over there. The job growth has been mostly low wage over the last ten years. Our future job growth will be low wage as well. BLS reports bear this out. Cashiers and home health aids are not paying a living wage 2 areas of job growth in the future. In fact 7 out of 10 growth areas in the future will be low wage jobs. Everybody can not be a nurse it is already becoming flooded. Lots of kids will be at home because their jobs will not pay a living wage.
Part of the blame has to be pegged on the boomers. Maybe even the boomers parents too. In a ten generation cycle the boomers had to be the worst generation. These people just swallowed the ideological subversion whole. They completely rejected knowledge, restraint and the moral law that society is built on. Instead they built their life on a base of selfish desires and compulsive materialism.
This generation completely jettisoned what worked for thousands of years - namely morals- and absorbed themselves in all matters of selfishness. From degenerate sex, to materialism, to drug use, to individualism to the point of abject selfishness, the boomers annexed every form of ideological subversion whole. In many ways their children are the expression of their culture. The paradox is that all of this individualism fosters dependency. The fruits of materialism and selfishness is isolation; isolated people whose degenerate behavior/selfishness likely lead to divorce will find that their shallow quest lead to them being alone. It is these people who very much want their kids to stay in the nest as this is all they have. They keep their children in a state of suspended adolescence and their kids happily stay home enjoying the fruits of the materialist world while never attaining the responsibility of adulthood.
This current generation of self-centered materialists are the scions of a generation that lost its way. Some of us are waking up to the cultural disaster and perhaps more are waking up day after day. My hope is that the next generation cycles away from selfishness and materialism. We need a generation that rejects the gadget mental masturbation, the spiritually bankrupt materialist religion, and jettisons the selfish degenerate morals of the boomer generation along with their lazy offspring.
Last edited by samyn on the green; 08-20-2010 at 10:29 PM..
The ridiculous amount of student loan debt. By this time next year, I will need to start paying the $50k or so I owe in loans. Mind you, I go to a public state university and have received a scholarship that covers about half of the cost amount each year. I feel bad for the people who went to very pricey private and public colleges/universities that owe way more in loans.
Ironically, it is my mother who WANTS me to live at home after I graduate, just so I can save up and pay those loans asap. I would rather move out and start living my life as a young adult. We both agree on one thing: that I should pay off my loans as quickly as possible. I wouldn't want to burden my father with my loans (he's the co-signer); my parents have enough on their plate! I just want to pay of the loans within the 5 years (hopefully in less time) after graduation and move on with my life being debt-free. This seems like a reasonable goal.
It is all about the lack of jobs and the cost of living. It is really that simple.
I don't really think that's true. The trend toward younger people living more with their parents started even when the job market was good.
The cost of living does play a role. It is harder to get your life off the ground today with the high cost of living relative to starting salaries. But I think it's also true that this generation prefers to stay at home with their parents to avoid sacrifice, while previous generations would have chosen to do without and pinch pennies rather than get stuck living with their parents as adults. The change is more than just a lack of jobs, which is only a very recent thing.
I don't really think that's true. The trend toward younger people living more with their parents started even when the job market was good.
The cost of living does play a role. It is harder to get your life off the ground today with the high cost of living relative to starting salaries. But I think it's also true that this generation prefers to stay at home with their parents to avoid sacrifice, while previous generations would have chosen to do without and pinch pennies rather than get stuck living with their parents as adults. The change is more than just a lack of jobs, which is only a very recent thing.
I don't know...you could look over a larger timeframe and say moving out and living independently of your parents (withough getting married) is a "recent" thing. Generations ago, people lived with their parents until they married and established a household. If they didn't marry, it wasnt' unusual for them to live at home and care for their parents. Moving out and living "independently" was more a result of the post-war economy. Jobs were plentiful as were educational opportunities. That became the norm. Now, with jobs being scarce and education being expensive (and not just college, my DD has a friend who owes quite a bit of money for trade school), people are reverting back to what used to be the norm. There are also some cultures and families where living at home has always been the expectation - saving money so that when the time comes, there is a good downpayment on a house. Unless one party or the other is unhappy with the situation, I fail to see where this is a huge problem or anyone else's concern.
Now - a grown adult offspring who is living at home should be responsible - offering to pay some (even if minimal) rent and his/her expenses, and/or helping out around the house. If that is not going on, then that is another problem all together.
I don't know...you could look over a larger timeframe and say moving out and living independently of your parents (withough getting married) is a "recent" thing. Generations ago, people lived with their parents until they married and established a household. If they didn't marry, it wasnt' unusual for them to live at home and care for their parents. Moving out and living "independently" was more a result of the post-war economy. Jobs were plentiful as were educational opportunities. That became the norm. Now, with jobs being scarce and education being expensive (and not just college, my DD has a friend who owes quite a bit of money for trade school), people are reverting back to what used to be the norm. There are also some cultures and families where living at home has always been the expectation - saving money so that when the time comes, there is a good downpayment on a house. Unless one party or the other is unhappy with the situation, I fail to see where this is a huge problem or anyone else's concern.
Now - a grown adult offspring who is living at home should be responsible - offering to pay some (even if minimal) rent and his/her expenses, and/or helping out around the house. If that is not going on, then that is another problem all together.
True, you're looking at things from a longer perspective. There are lots of things at play here. People also get married older than they did. In general, with the more complex world we live in, it takes longer to establish yourself as an adult. And many people seem to be in no hurry to do that.
Continuing to live with parents doesn't necessarily mean you can't function as an adult. I know every situation is different, but it seems that many of the young adults living with parents still have their parents cooking their meals, doing their laundry, cleaning their rooms, and paying some of their bills. So in cases like that, they're really not functioning as adults.
Though I'm a tail-end boomer myself, I'm a bit of a boomer basher. I don't like that generation in general, and I think they have a lot to do with this issue. Generally, this is a generation that has taken everything to excess. They made things very easy for their kids, mainly to feed their own egos, and many went deeply into debt to do it. They've put the country deeply into debt, on a personal and public level. So they've created a very nice environment for their kids at home, often on an unstainable basis. At the same time, the flip side is that they've made the working world an unadulterated living hell. Their philosophy is that you should never be done working, should be available by remote communication 24/7, etc. It gets worse and worse every year, and the boomers have been the driving force in this nasty trend. Who can blame their kids for not wanting to fully engage in the hellish outside world their parents have created, and choosing to remain cossetted in the artificial cushy world of their parents at home?
Thats so true. I'll always remember when I first met my boyfriend he had a basic flip phone (this was last year). I asked him why he had such an old phone and he said "there is no point to getting a new phone when this one still works". Keep in mind he makes more money than I will probably ever make in my industry.
HANG ON to this guy...he is going to be one wealthy cat.
Though I'm a tail-end boomer myself, I'm a bit of a boomer basher. I don't like that generation in general, and I think they have a lot to do with this issue. Generally, this is a generation that has taken everything to excess. They made things very easy for their kids, mainly to feed their own egos, and many went deeply into debt to do it. They've put the country deeply into debt, on a personal and public level. So they've created a very nice environment for their kids at home, often on an unstainable basis. At the same time, the flip side is that they've made the working world an unadulterated living hell. Their philosophy is that you should never be done working, should be available by remote communication 24/7, etc. It gets worse and worse every year, and the boomers have been the driving force in this nasty trend. Who can blame their kids for not wanting to fully engage in the hellish outside world their parents have created, and choosing to remain cossetted in the artificial cushy world of their parents at home?
Well, you're now bringing in all kinds of other issues. Of course everything is interrelated somehow but still.....
While I agree with much of what you've said, every generation has been "easier" in some way that the generation before. And harder. I do feel that we're in a hell of a mess. Are there those who are living at home, with all the "toys" available to them, while mom does their laundry and cooks their meals? Of course there are. I think there always have been and always will be. I think the recent upswing in numbers though is more economically driven. No matter what sand people want to stick their heads in, jobs ARE scarce right now. It is hard to be independent when you can't find a full time job. Unskilled positions rarely hire full time workers, skilled positions require training that typically costs money, and for many of these young people, they started off college at a time when it wasn't outrageous to expect to be able to find a job upon graduation. They are in fact, doing the financially responsible thing by living at home so whatever they make can go to paying off the debt they have incurred getting educated (be it college or trade school). They are trying to start off in the middle of a big mess - not of their own making. Many would prefer to move out and be on their own but unfortunately, are unable to do that right now.
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it is the boomers fault
Mind you, I go to a public state university and have received a scholarship that covers about half of the cost amount each year. I feel bad for the people who went to very pricey private and public colleges/universities that owe way more in loans.
This seems like a reasonable goal.
