A majority of young adults in the U.S. live with their parents

https://www.pewresearch.org/fact-tank/2020/09/04/a-majority-of-young-adults-in-the-u-s-live-with-their-parents-for-the-first-time-since-the-great-depression/

by miles • 5 years ago

53 71 5 years ago

pewresearch.org

pope_meat2• 5 years ago

I don't know why the poor's keep complaining, everything is great.

Median income statistic as proof

I am very smart.

kaycebasques• 5 years ago

It's funny how different the connotations of this are in the US compared to, I think, many countries in the rest of the world. I just spent a few months in Brazil and my impression was that it's common/normal for people to live with their parents longer. I believe it's similar in Italy? For men, at least. Am I wrong about those two? For the non-US HN crowd, what about your country?

mullingitover2• 5 years ago

It's not that it's different than the rest of the world, it's that in the past the US was wealthy enough that this wasn't a typical thing to do. The news here is more that the US is in decline, and it's no longer standard for young people to be able to afford to live on their own.

pope_meat2• 5 years ago

The US is in decline for some of us.

The wealthy folks are raking it in like never before.

LurkingPenguin• 5 years ago

Exactly. I live in an East Asian country and my impression is that generally speaking young people who live at home would prefer to live alone but don't because of finances and filial piety.

jefftk2• 5 years ago

It's less that the US has become less wealthy, and more that we have manufactured a housing crisis by refusing to allow people to construct housing to keep up with demand.

chiefalchemist4• 5 years ago

To be fair, the USA being in decline isn't necessarily causation for young people not being able to afford to live on the their own.

The key issue is the cost of housing; which the USA is reluctant and resolve. Student loan debt also factors in to this situation.

Are those driving the USA's decline? Or simply symptoms of a systems dedicated more to Wall Street and less to Main Street?

cardosof• 5 years ago

That's normal for most latin cultures. The max normally accepted age varies of course but it's quite higher than in other cultures.

nmridul• 5 years ago

Even the richest Indian, Mukesh Ambani stay with his mother, wife and kids.

> What is most striking though is that contrary to popular perception, more of the poorest Indians live in nuclear families than the affluent do

Quoted from this . https://www.bbc.com/news/world-asia-india-54053091

chrisseaton3• 5 years ago

unmarried students who reside in on-campus college dorms are counted as living in their family home

Eh? So if more people went to college it would show up as more living at home?

jackson1442• 5 years ago

Partly because dorms will kick you out over longer breaks (winter and summer) and will expect you to leave for shorter breaks (thanksgiving, if you’re somewhere with a weeklong break and spring break).

Over winter break I had to turn in my room key to the desk and my access card was deactivated. Those who paid to stay thru winter had to move to a specified dorm.

So yeah, you still have to depend on someone else for housing while in the dorms, at least how I experienced it.

yardie4• 5 years ago

Kids, stay at home, save money, use your parents insurance until 26, save money. Car insurance is high until 25, except if you’re on your parents policy. I bought my first flat at 29 after a string of bad decisions in my youth. The best thing you can do is set up an investment account early and let the savings compound.

chrisseaton3• 5 years ago

You shouldn’t save money over looking after your mental health. Your own space as an adult is important.

anonnyj• 5 years ago

Constantly splurging on instant gratifications does the opposite of help one's mental health.

kiba2• 5 years ago

That should be determined on an individual basis and living situation.

Not everybody has parents that they can tolerate.

pessimizer• 5 years ago

People have usually lived with/near their extended families for most of their lives for thousands of years, and currently in most cultures. It isn't a proof or cause of mental illness.

It's a failure of reproduction of the middle class, though. When you're born rich, it's easy to die rich (without being adventurously stupid), when you're born poor, it's effortless to die poor. The middle-class is the class that has to rebuild every generation. We've allowed so much corruption and rent-seeking that it's not happening anymore.

hgs3• 5 years ago

Moving out caused my mental health to deteriorate. The meaninglessness of living alone and wasting my life working for Big Corp made me suicidal. I was hospitalized in a psych ward for a week. I tried half a dozen antidepressants. Nothing helped. Now I've moved back with my parents and I'm trying to turn my own, meaningful (to me) projects into a business. I don't know if things will work out financially, but I already feel much better than I did. Regardless, I don't believe I'll ever feel the way I once did about this world.

megohere• 5 years ago

Now, this is a real boomer take.

The issue isn't that young people don't want to move into their own place. It's that they literally can't without ruining themselves. For me, moving out of my parents place would mean moving to a tiny shithole that costs over 800CAD and is situated in the worst neighborhood of my city. It would be worse for my mental health (which is already hampered because I find modern cities unbearable) but also an idiotic financial decision.

Point is, all I want is to move away and live in solitude and independence but I think the government would probably find me even if I moved into a cabin in the woods in Yukon.

kirse• 5 years ago

There's also benefits to establishing independence early and reaping the compounded rewards of a lifetime of confidence built through bearing burden(s) of responsibility.

chiefalchemist4• 5 years ago

Yes and no, but financially speaking mostly no. If you can save even a small but reasonable amount of money from say age 21 to 25 your retirement investing will be completed. Compound interest and all that good stuff.

ravenstine• 5 years ago

From a financial standpoint, I definitely agree. On the other hand, that perspective can easily become a crutch especially if it is normalized. There's also the risk of creating more generations of even less capable adults than the ones whom already exist. Some already self-aware individuals could make proper use of their parent's abode into early adulthood, but there's also others who to some extent actually need life to give them at least a small kick in the pants so they wake up and get their shit together. People say that remote work isn't for everyone, thus we shouldn't also pretend like "just live at home, bruh" is the right thing for the vast majority.

kiba2• 5 years ago

In some countries, it's completely normal to live with your parents. Do you really think that they have less independent adults than Americans?

roenxi2• 5 years ago

This is a respectable strategy, but in a more prosperous society we would expect people to be able to have stuff and establish themselves as adults early.

We live in an age of literal miracles. Thinking rocks, floating metal, what amounts to telepathy, machines roaming the countryside that dwarf giants, bodies being reshaped and redrawn, pandemics being fought back after a year or two. There really need to be some hard questions asked about why exactly a kid can't expect to move in to their own a home at 20.

I'm not saying there are easy answers. Maybe the world is just so complicated that a normal 20 year old can't make a meaningful contribution any more. But it is worth at least talking form time to time about why it is so hard to for young people to be independent. What exactly is the deal they are being offered here?

mgh25• 5 years ago

Thinking rocks, floating metal, what amounts to telepathy, machines roaming the countryside that dwarf giants, bodies being reshaped and redrawn.

?? Please elaborate.

Ask foreigners: They don't have parent's insurance or homes, yet are expected to survive without being able to take jobs that are reserved for Americans only. Americans have it easy.

MattGaiser4• 5 years ago

There really need to be some hard questions asked about why exactly a kid can't expect to move in to their own a home at 20.

You can, just not a nice one in a major city. Given the choice between my parent's house and a small condo, house is a lot nicer.

Given the options, it will never be the case that a 20 year old can have the same standard of living as what they grew up with right away. You choices are to lower your standard of living as you just aren't as valuable economically or stay put.

adriangrigore2• 5 years ago

Living without any expectations is the healthy way to live. How to not have expectations, take things as they are, and understand that it's false that they "should" be in any other way.

adriangrigore2• 5 years ago

Depends on a number of factors. Each person is different goes thru different experiences, it's not "just do that".

giantg2• 5 years ago

This doesn't seem like a big deal. The group that would typically be out of college (25-29) only increased from 26% to 28%.

chiefalchemist4• 5 years ago

The coronavirus outbreak has pushed millions of Americans, especially young adults, to move in with family members.

This statement isn't accurate. What triggered this movement was the economic fallout from the government's reaction to the Covid 19 pandemic; not the pandemic itself.

Furthermore, it would be hekpful to understand how many of these households were eventually victims (?) of Covid 19. That is, risk adverse individual moves home. Carries on with usual lifestyle. Eventually gets sick, infects others at home, and so on.

chiefalchemist4• 5 years ago

Note to self: Never point out newspeak on HN. Instead just repeat the narrative and let deception persist.

SantalBlush• 5 years ago

The sense of martyrdom around here is just too much, and this comment exemplifies it.

harmegido• 5 years ago

I'm cautiously curious about how you'd interpret this data: https://www.nytimes.com/2020/05/07/upshot/pandemic-economy-g...

It seems pretty straightforward to me that a massive pandemic is going to hurt the economy, regardless of government action. I'm sure there will be other data points to look at in the future for what the consequences of various responses were (e.g. Sweden vs neighbors/etc?).

baron816• 5 years ago

I'm hoping there will be a big housing boom this decade. I think with remote work, and a continued backlash against NIMBYism, it's not unlikely.

That'll keep the economy driving forward, plus create a lot of nice blue collar jobs for people. Plus, it could drive a baby boom.

ipnon2• 5 years ago

What young adults are waiting for is a housing bust, a generational dip, a once in a lifetime buying opportunity to get on the housing ladder at a fair price.

ryan93• 5 years ago

Same thing

x3sphere• 5 years ago

Yeah it's unlikely to happen though. The conditions of this housing boom are nothing like the last one. Mortgage requirements much more stringent.

Additionally, monetary policy in the US is responsible for inflating assets and they are showing no intention to raise rates in any significant way. Maybe prices cool off a bit when they eventually start to raise rates but I expect there will be no bust. These prices are the new normal.

ipnon2• 5 years ago

I think it's hard for most American homeowners to make a connection between their rising home equity, and their children being dependent on them for basic needs past an "acceptable" age.

cyberge99• 5 years ago

It would be interesting to see how the numbers compare this year.

MattGaiser4• 5 years ago

I am Canadian, but I do this and I have a bunch of friends that do this, even with well paying jobs.

You can save and invest, cut your insurance costs for vehicles, use their health insurance, not have to buy all the other appliances that people tend to, etc.

You can compress this chart by literally decades in a few years.

https://fourpillarfreedom.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/01/sav...

Yes, you need to launch sometime, but why not wait and do it in a financial Saturn V?

A majority of young adults in the U.S. live with their parents

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