Remember that bullshit NY Times article about “emerging adolescence”? Two rebuttals via Feministing are far more coherent than I was:
Everyone I know who did a stint of living at home while legally an adult, including myself, did so out of financial necessity. That’s 100% of folks I’ve heard of doing so. In a way, it’s too bad, because the notion that living with your parents after becoming an adult is some great marker of shame is a relatively new idea, born out of the prosperity of the mid-century in America that our smug Boomer seems to think is just evidence of her super-awesome-better-than-you-ness. Throughout most of American history, family living with family wasn’t considered anything but normal, and in fact sort of the point of having a family. [Adulthood, Lack of Jobs, and Slippery Definitions]
With unemployment for those aged 20-34 up 179 percent between 2006 and 2009, the average student debt burden at $23,186, wages fairly stagnant over the last several decades, and health benefits (when they exist at all) eating up a growing percentage of workers’ incomes, is it any wonder that young adults are avoiding long-term financial commitments and depending more (when they can) on parents? [In Defense of Today’s 2-Somethings (And Our Parents)]
