7 ms·

Growing-ups

101 points by timw6n 12y ago

tommo123 12y ago
Surely that should be 'growings-up'? Motion to burn at the stake the author/poster until we reach a conclusion
- x3c 12y ago
  It's based on grown-ups. So I think, it's correct.
rayiner 12y ago
I don't know if this is a "new" stage of life or rather a return to an earlier way of life. The whole phenomenon of kids leaving the house at 18, moving across the country, and not coming home again is fairly recent and fairly unique to the Western world. My wife and I are "grown ups" in the sense that we both are done with grad school, have professional jobs, and have a kid. Yet, my mom lives with us during the week and we spend nearly every weekend at my parents' house in D.C. Not because they need our support, but because we need theirs'. This is a living situation that wouldn't be unfamiliar to my grandparents back in Bangladesh, where the expectation, back then, was that a young couple would move back into the husband's parents' home after marriage. It's novel relative to what I encountered growing up (in the U.S.), but it's not "new." Various studies have shown that Millenials are closer to their parents than any generation in recent memory. They are not only likely to live with them after graduating college, but turn to them regularly for career advice, take them on job interviews for support. It's the opposite of the rebellious streak that characterized the baby boomers.
- aaronem 12y ago
  That makes sense; to oversimplify somewhat, the boomers tended to be really crap as parents, resulting in a generation (my generation, more or less) who are absolutely adamant that they won't inflict the same on their own kids. This seems to have resulted in a close and strongly nurturing, if at times somewhat smothering, parenting style, which in turn gave rise to the millennials, who seem by and large to have much stronger family ties than their parents' generation does. (By the way, I'm a member of the "moved across the country at 18 and never looked back" cohort, and I've occasionally had reason to wish I weren't; by placing myself far beyond any distance at which I could reasonably hope to receive the support of my family, I set myself up to blow a scholarship and drop out of school half a semester in. I've managed to make my way in the world reasonably well despite that, and have no real reason to be dissatisfied with my lot, but it certainly gives useful perspective on some of my fellows' declamations of narcissism and selfishness on the part of the generation following ours -- if I'd had some of that "narcissism" and "selfishness" when I was young, I'd have a doctorate now.)
  - seanccox 12y ago
    That's an interesting observation. I had thought it was really more the result of the prevailing economic conditions, rather than the result of a strong, nurturing relationship. These are hypotheses that I would really like to see tested, that way I know whether to blame parents for causing economic crisis, or for babying their children (j/k).
    - maxerickson 12y ago
      It's interesting to look at the one time events that have happened in the last few (or several) generations. The destruction of farming/agriculture as the primary source of employment and the post war boom would be two big ones. I think the change in agriculture is interesting here because the decision making process for the child of a (relatively poor) farmer wouldn't have been very involved, they would be quite likely to do what they knew. There would also probably be quite some pressure on them to get to it. The post war boom is interesting because there were substantial opportunities for every single 18 year old that went looking for them. That's probably still reasonably true today, but the opportunities are at least riskier (in a life trajectory sense) than getting a good paying job at a mill or factory.
      - randomdata 12y ago
        Great point about agriculture. Fortunately, telecommuting enabled me to stay on the farm, which couldn't support me by itself. Had I been born a decade earlier, moving away to a populous area would have been an almost certainty. If you have to move away from your family, the risk is already high, so what's a little more? Now, the vast majority of the population already live in urban areas, so we are back to not having to move very far from your family.
        maxerickson 12y ago
        I didn't say much about it, but part of what I was thinking about is that someone who has had the experience of picking from many choices is probably going to give better advice to a child doing the same thing than someone who had one path that was quite clear. (Which isn't contrary to anything you said, it's just another factor)
- chanced 12y ago
  > [Millenials] take [their parents] on job interviews for support No wonder my generation can't get a damn job.
  - aaronem 12y ago
    I missed that bit the first time through. That seems to me to fall well on the wrong side of the line between "strong family ties" and "just plain not equipped to cope".
- pawelk 12y ago
  > The whole phenomenon of kids leaving the house at 18, moving across the country, and not coming home again is fairly recent and fairly unique to the Western world. I live in Poland and I'm the first generation that grew up after the fall of communism. I have seen this transition first-hand. I grew up in a multi-generation home with my grandparents and parents sharing the same space. I have left at 19 to another city, but some of my family members have stayed and there are four generations living in the house right now. My parents share a floor with my mother's dad, my father's mom and my brother (in his twenties). On another floor lives my mom's sister with her family (husband, daughter and daughter's children). Houses built to accommodate two or three generations were common even 30 years ago. Many people, especially in small towns and villages have built huge houses with the assumption that each of their kids will stay there and needs a floor of their own. Then, suddenly, so many things have changed. We can - or have to - work abroad, or move halfway across the country to study and then find a job. Many of those large houses are so sad right now with just a couple of elder people using two rooms and the kitchen with hundreds of square meters of empty space, sometimes filled with stuff left behind by their children who can't take it all with them to their studio apartments. I don't know of anyone from my generation who would event think of building a house with their future kids and grandchildren in mind. But I think we're trading an important aspect of our culture for... I don't know. Money, success, independence, all these western things. I don't think I have a point here, just wanted to share.
  - rayiner 12y ago
    As someone with no experience with Poland, that description was fascinating. Thank you for sharing! > I don't know of anyone from my generation who would event think of building a house with their future kids and grandchildren in mind. But I think we're trading an important aspect of our culture for... I don't know. Money, success, independence, all these western things. Maybe somewhat ironically, for my wife and I our living situation has been driven by the pursuit of career success. My wife and I are at the stage of our careers where we're really putting in the hours, and sharing a household with my parents makes life a hundred times easier. We don't have to worry about getting home before the nanny has to go, we don't have to worry about taking a day off when the baby's daycare is closed. We come home to a hot meal. Meanwhile, my parents are thrilled to be so actively invoked in their granddaughter's life.
pawn 12y ago
I wonder how much variation there is between different cultures. I don't have a lot of context to go off of myself, but speaking to some of my Indian friends, it seems more prevalent in their culture to stay with your parents until you're married rather than running off while you're still single.
- srs0001 12y ago
  Although this is genuinely a positive article about young people, I feel that pulling conclusions about all 18 to 29-year-olds is painting with a broad stroke.
mml 12y ago
Many "emerging adults", in my limited experience, eventually transition into the "desperately poor" category when they run out of other peoples' money. I'm going to go shake my cane and yell at clouds now.
- chanced 12y ago
  Yelling at clouds is the best, especially if you have a cane handy.
ekpyrotic 12y ago
It wouldn't be too hard to argue that the Baby Boomers are strange. Not Gen X, Y and Z. Until the 1950s, young people in the west were expected to live with their parents until they married and settled down. Just crack open a Victorian novel. (A few HNers have noted that this is true in India, China and Japan; but it was also true in the west.) This changed all at one and all of a sudden under the Baby Boomers. Young people left home earlier, travelled the world, experimented with drugs. Let's forget that the Baby Boomers were responsible for psychedelia, the protest movement and flower power. Here's what I'm saying: The Baby Boomers were a blip, premeditated by the astronomical rise of the USA in the global economy. Money and jobs were everywhere all of a sudden, endowing people (and especially young people) with the new freedom to experiment. Something that is not true now: We're facing increased global competition from the East and the west's manufacturing base has been hollowed out. In terms of global and Western culture they were a non-stereotypical blip, the result of very particular and unusual economic and social conditions, a few flicks of the second hand on the our cultural watch. So, are the Baby Boomers justified in criticising this generation for returning to former cultural values and habits? Personally, I don't think so. It's hard not to feel it smacks of myopia, of judging others through the wrong side of the binoculars.
- HNJohnC 12y ago
  Um...who do you think raised these Gen X, Y and Z people? Perhaps they were raised badly?
- jamesbritt 12y ago
  This changed all at one and all of a sudden under the Baby Boomers. Young people left home earlier, travelled the world, experimented with drugs. Let's forget that the Baby Boomers were responsible for psychedelia, the protest movement and flower power. I'm puzzled how people can make generalizations about a group people born over a range of 18 years. While the notion of "generation <foo>" is dubious in itself, claiming that someone born in 1946 has a whole lot in common with someone born in 1964 seems especially silly. What I've found is most people, when talking about "boomers", really mean the subset of those who might have plausibly attended the first Woodstock festival.
noelwelsh 12y ago
Only had time to skim the article, but the section on work caught my eye. Like a lot of people I was fairly dissatisfied with my early career, but, luckily, as a programmer my job had some future prospects worth obtaining. I now really like what I do, and I've learned a bit about the nature of work. A few things come to mind: 0. The more competent you are at something, the more interesting it becomes. Expecting your first job to be interesting is setting yourself up for disappointment. 1. Autonomy, at least for me, is really important. 2. Nobody hires someone else to do the most interesting work available. 3. The best jobs aren't advertised. Visibility, or self-promotion, is important to some degree. The awesome thing about computing is the capital costs are so low you can short circuit a lot of the career progression. You'll probably still make a mess of your first N years, which is why venture capital was invented ;-)
- samatman 12y ago
  Perhaps I was fortunate in my career choices, but #2 is not my experience. Plenty of people are hiring for problems they don't fully understand and can't solve, or they wouldn't be hiring. Often enough, those are the interesting problems.
pistle 12y ago
You now what this article needs? More cowbell! I mean graphs! This is a social phenomenon being critiqued using self-reported social scoring without tying it back to either theoretical or applied economic models. If large swaths are asked fairly banal "Will you get what you want out of life?" questions with waaaaaay more rigorous subjective and practical analysis a bigger picture can't be assessed. Elders "ridiculing," which is really a cynical take on what people older than adult children are doing, are expressing some insight into the pitfalls of delayed productive income acquisition. This article also flies in the face of trends that HN loves. We've seen articles questioning and advocating against ageism, as if this was somehow unique to HN-fields of interest. Whether it is pop music, high art, math, or technology (or many other fields), the people who "make a difference" and live those envious lives of freedom to walk the path to becoming all-stars in their field and/or lives... those are young people. Sure, some fields require great levels of extended experience or knowledge only acquirable through time, but the people getting everything out of life most frequently start early with a passionate drive for exactly what they will become. The ascendant efforts of the young from about 18-30 is vital, innovative, and disruptive. I dislike the "disrupt everything!" mantra that leads the naive into the ditch. Fail fast can easily lead to lost opportunities to establish strong financial and technical (or creative) foundations that enable the later bloomers their time in the sun. It's tough at the top and there are only so many who can get there now or ever. For the rest, it's best to be able to get productive to start saving early to establish a life where you can get ENOUGH out of life to not hit some anxious or depressive state later when you see doors closing to attaining EVERYTHING. It's efficient to be able to minimize suffering as you go versus rolling the dice that you will suddenly find a calling later. Feast upon life to learn everything you can. Deconstruct suffering and you'll find ways big and small to constantly create a life that you wouldn't trade for some amorphous "everything." The destination (goals) is usually only a milestone in the journey you are already engaged in. "If you don't stop to look around once in a while, you might miss it."
- rayiner 12y ago
  > The ascendant efforts of the young from about 18-30 is vital, innovative, and disruptive. It's important, but if you look out your window, the world that exists out there was designed and built mostly by people over 30. There are some geniuses that were most prolific in their 20's (Einstein's miracle year was at 26), but most people who are awarded the nobel prize do their most important work from 30-50 (http://www.nature.com/news/2011/111107/full/news.2011.632.html http://www.nature.com/news/2011/111107/full/news.2011.632.ht...). Picasso started developing cubism around the age of 30, Braque at about the same time. The young have particular relevance in the area of entertainment (pop music, Facebook), largely because so much entertainment is targeted at the young. They also have particular importance in the area of mathematics. But the kind of day-to-day innovation that makes the world go around is a process of stepping on the shoulders of those who came before. And it's experienced people who understand what came before who do that most efficiently.
taybin 12y ago
Let me know when they have a spouse, child, and mortgage. That's the dividing line, as far as I can tell.
- nileshtrivedi 12y ago
  What precisely is it about having a child and having a mortgage that qualifies someone as "grown-up"? (I'm speaking as someone who has a wife, a kid and a house bought outright).
  - bjelkeman-again 12y ago
    It brings things which are considered grown-up sharply into focus. Nothing seems to encourage bringing home some money for food and housing like a child or two. At least that is my interpretation.
  - declan 12y ago
    >What precisely is it about having a child and having a mortgage that qualifies someone as "grown-up"? It's shorthand for assuming adult responsibilities. It's difficult to survive on your emotionally fulfilling but minimum wage job if you have a brood in diapers at home. Obviously you still have responsibilities, probably including property taxes, insurance, and utilities, if you own your house outright as opposed to having a mortgage. BTW, it's a bit tricky to buy your home outright if you live, in, say Palo Alto, where I recall a bunch of YC-funded startups are based: http://www.paloaltoonline.com/news/2013/12/24/real-estate-matters http://www.paloaltoonline.com/news/2013/12/24/real-estate-ma... "In Palo Alto the median sales price for a home was $2.2 million..."
    - nileshtrivedi 12y ago
      I understand that IF you have a spouse or kids, it's your responsibility to take care of them and provide the best possible environment for them to flourish. But it does not follow that it's one's responsibility to marry and have kids. There have been plenty of people who contributed a lot to society without ever marrying or raising kids. You're right that managing a family is shorthand for being responsible. My point is: why use a shorthand when you can simply ask "So what are you doing with all the extra time you get because of not having a family?". Ask, don't presume. (I am not even getting into the whole philosophical debate of whether "work == virtue". The subtext in comments like the above is: "Oh, you're living a comfortable life with no responsibilities? You should work hard and suffer like the rest of us!" )
jimbokun 12y ago
"Adulthood is full of onerous responsibilities, as all of us who have been there for a while know well: going to work every day, making the meals, keeping the household reasonably clean and orderly, paying the bills." That's the bar for onerous, now? And this is an attitude we, as parents and as society, are obligated to encourage, support, and indulge?
- bluemnmtattoo 12y ago
  But if there's no point to all of it, then there's no point That's not attitude that's science Space exploration is the point
diegomcfly 12y ago
If you are an "emerging adult" at age 30, then there is a problem. Further, the author of this article claiming that these so called "emerging adults" are not lazy or self-entitled is ridiculous. It is clearly a case of "first world problems". The mere fact that these "emerging adults" have the luxury of living "on the dole" (whether parental or governmental) while they "figure out what they want to do with their lives" into their late 20s and early 30s is a clear case of self-entitlement. If you don't have a place to live, food to eat, and shelter ... you "emerge" as an adult pretty quickly and figure out what you "want to do with your life" by DOING WORK you don't want to do to get said food, and shelter (i.e., to survive). What is the saying? An absence of alternatives clears the mind marvelously.
- invalidOrTaken 12y ago
  "...But follow your dreams!"
- UK-AL 12y ago
  Most survival work like that doesn't pay that well, so you would not be able to get shelter, food etc anyway. A large majority of professional jobs in business, programming, accountancy, consultancy are filled with people who want to be there. I am in a professional job, and I doubt I could afford a decent place to live without parental help other than a crappy flat in a dodgy area. How people afford to live by themselves, on non-professional jobs I don't know.
  - diegomcfly 12y ago
    >I am in a professional job, and I doubt I could afford a decent place to live without parental help other than a crappy flat in a dodgy area. Then live in a the "crappy flat in a dodgy area". >How people afford to live by themselves, on non-professional jobs I don't know. Then don't live by yourself. I had 2 and 3 roommates over various times as a young person getting started. We split the rent in crappy small apartments.
- mtrimpe 12y ago
  We're moving from investing ~20 years into children into investing ~30 years into children. Makes perfect sense given how the world had been changing...
Beasting247 12y ago
This article takes way too long to get to the point. Can I get the Cliff-Notes?
- diegomcfly 12y ago
  Yes .. here you go: The article is about the self-entitled generation of "emerging adults" (apparently who range from 18 to 40) of which the author was a part of, but now spends his time writing long-winded articles rationalizing how they (he) are not lazy and self-entitled.
pnathan 12y ago
> They expect work to be fun, and if it’s not fun, they refuse to do it. That is a big difference and a good way to sum it up. Unfortunately, lots of jobs are both needed and full of drudgery.
- dropit_sphere 12y ago
  >Unfortunately, lots of jobs are both needed and full of drudgery. I get the feeling millennials are calling that bluff: "If it's so needed, why won't they hire me for it/why doesn't it pay more?'
  - pnathan 12y ago
    * why won't they hire me for it Because "you" got a humanities degree and "it" is a tradesperson job which does not "make the world better". "You" chose to pursue "fun and interesting", and didn't run the numbers on "ROI", which only geeks, low-class people, and in-it-for-the-money people did. * why doesn't it pay more? Because experience counts a tremendous amount, far more than willingness to show up. /me shrug A lot of tradespeople jobs are done by immigrants willing to work many hours with low pay where natives are out looking for "rewarding" and "fulfilling" work. The Great Hand of Bettering Yourself By Hard Work will sort it out, more or less, more or less unevenly, in the end.
    - dropit_sphere 12y ago
      Fine---but if the jobs are being done, why all the whining about "kids these days?"
      - mason240 12y ago
        Because "kids these days" are refusing to do them, yet demanding they have better lifestyle then the people who are doing them.
    - ameister14 12y ago
      I don't think either of those answers is correct. Bettering yourself with hard work is a religious notion. It's not necessarily true, but it's good for people that own things that need to be worked on, like farmland. It keeps people working. If the jobs are necessary, though, they should be paid with that in mind. They are not. Manufacturing production is up, but wages are stagnant. I don't think it's entitlement that makes people recognize that. Most people that now trust in 'The Great Hand of Bettering Yourself By Hard Work' as you put it will be out of a job in 30 years; we've already started that trend.
bicx 12y ago
This is interesting to me because my brother and I (both in our later twenties), ended up taking two different paths. I knew what I wanted to do since high school (software engineering), unwaveringly pursued my 4-year degree with solid scholarships, got a good job the day after I graduated, and bought a house at 25 with a decent down-payment. My brother, on the other hand, did not have that kind of luck. He tinkered around in college, then joined the Navy. After a couple years, he was discharged early (but honorably) due to panic attacks while attempting one of their most difficult programs. Now he's back at my parents' house as he pursues his degree in environmental science (the closest thing he could think of that matched his interests) at a community college. My family noticed he seemed a bit depressed as his 25th birthday approached last month. Turns out he was pretty upset that at 25, he hadn't gotten anywhere in life. I feel sorry for him because he's compared to me. I am not a better person. I just have a more studious, middle-of-the-road demeanor, and I know what I want to pursue. There was no moment where I was like, "Man, I need to settle down and pick a career." It just happened, and I was blessed enough to have had a straight path to the "American dream." My brother isn't in that stage of emerging adulthood by choice. He wants to be viewed as a respectable adult. It's just that he was not gifted with well-defined, lucrative goals, and he doesn't want to do something he hates simply for a good paycheck. I wouldn't have either. It just worked out better for me, and now I look like I have my shit together.
- sbilstein 12y ago
  I feel the same way. My success as a programmer is some combination of luck and hard work, but it'd be unfair to judge others based on the kind of luck I've had. I was lucky to have been exposed to computing at an early age, stumble upon source code for qbasic games, like programming, major in it, and happen to have my graduation date align with a huge period of growth in our industry. Good luck magnifies the effect of hard work, bad luck can make it appear non-existent.
  - bicx 12y ago
    Definitely. When I started my degree, it was during a time when everyone was worried that all IT-related were going to India. However, I chose CS anyway because I enjoyed it. I just lucked out. The industry has been booming, my LinkedIn account blows up with recruiter emails, and I traded my stuffy corporate job for a startup position with a work environment heavily weighted toward employee comfort. I get into work at 10am wearing shorts and a t-shirt, and somehow I'm still a responsible adult. It's ridiculous. Hard work definitely helped, but I was also at the right place at the right time.
morgante 12y ago
I really hate this term "emerging adults." Suddenly we're not full adults anymore, just because many people of my generation have failed to live up to the standard of adulthood? I really hope this isn't a trend/term which catches on and justifies continued ageism or the denial of rights. In general, I've always hated these "generational" descriptions. They're guaranteed to be woefully inaccurate for many people in the generation, yet provide ammunition for ageists to discriminate against young people. For my part, I haven't lived at home since I was 17 and, at 21, have a very "serious" job (which definitely pays the bills). I'm certainly not an outlier in this regard. The people who fail to do this are simply that: failures. (Though that failure isn't necessarily their fault.) Where does this fit in his theory of extended adolescence and infantilization?
- sho_hn 12y ago
  > The people who fail to do this are simply that: failures. Yup, sounds 21 to me. Quick to anger and lash out, quick to judge, moral certitude, and lack of empathy. For one, there's significant variance to how family units function across the human population. In many parts of the world, living together for far longer than 17 is the norm, and the model of how one generation financially supports the next, or families co-manage/pool their finances, works very differently. Often systems emerge that entrench this (e.g. the massive up-front down payments on rental apartments in the South Korean retail markets, which kids simply cannot afford because there's no time to make that kind of money). So blanket statements like this reek of cultural superiority and lack of education, frankly. I get that you're pissed because you don't feel you're getting the respect you deserve for your accomplishments (or at least that's what I seemed to read there), but starting with some humility and respect for others might change how people respond to you. (And yeah, I was financially self-sufficient at 21, too. Big deal. It's possible because I happened to enjoy doing work in an area and market that allowed for it. Many things worth pursueing, and of great contribution to society, don't make you money at 21.)
  - omni 12y ago
    > The people who fail to do this are simply that: failures. (Though that failure isn't necessarily their fault.) Did you just omit the second sentence so you could go on a little rant? Or did morgante edit his post?
johnnyg 12y ago
"I made enough to live on, but only because I had moved back home with my parents and didn’t have to pay for rent or groceries." No, no you didn't.
- bradleysmith 12y ago
  had the same thought at this line. The use of 'to live on' while not paying rent or groceries is very strange. These are the EXACT two bills I think of when I think of the base costs 'to live'.
ashleyjohn 12y ago
Interesting topic. It seems that every generation has something to criticize about the next. I'm sure that the Greatest Generation who witnessed both World War I, World War II and the Great Depression had a few words (critiques) about the Baby Boomers...just as the Baby Boomers have a few words about Generation Z (the Internet Generation)...
johnrob 12y ago
Much of the author's analysis is lacking economic perspective. In particular, I'd argue that a large contributor to 20 somethings with 'dead end' jobs is the obvious lack of 'real' jobs. Additionally, giving everyone a college degree is not going to magically place everyone on career paths - it will probably just debunk the assumed correlation between college degrees and careers by sinking all of the "x percent of college grads" stats.
MattyRad 12y ago
When I was a child, I asked my dad if his work was fun. He said, "If it was fun, they wouldn't pay you." I remember that from time to time, because it's true. Something that is fun (relative though "fun" is) doesn't warrant payment. When my mom asks about my current job, I sometimes repeat that phrase, and she gets all huffy and annoyed that I don't view my current job as enjoyable. Sure, my job is satisfying in small ways, but ultimately I'd rather be doing something else. I just mention it because my mom and dad show two sides of the generation mentality discussed in the article: the "buckle down and get a job" type, and the "you should do what you love" type.
- r00fus 12y ago
  Interesting how your parents have such archetypal responses. I kind of feel that it's "they're both right" but to go meta here, it's really a question of "what would motivate me to be a productive employee?". For some, it's respect in the terms of compensation. For others the reward needs to be from within (in addition to external compensation). From a management point of view, this is instructive - each employee is different and have different (vector of) motivations.
trustfundbaby 12y ago
I think that economic variables also play an very strong role in what we're seeing with delayed adulthood in millenials. Credit is much harder to come by, jobs are more difficult to get without a college education (addressed in the article), and there are also changing attitudes to sex and relationships that are becoming more pronounced with millenials (specifically casual sex/relationships) that make it easier for men (probably women as well) to put off marriage and having children. WRT to credit, when I got out of college back in 2003, I got a credit card with a $5000 limit in my mailbox which I started using immediately, I was talking to my brother who graduated last year and he says that those credit card offers are few and far between now, and that even when you get your hands on one, the credit limit is about $1000 ..... this blew me away. I couldn't have started my business without that $5000 credit card and much of what I have now revolves around the skills/experience I gained from my initial self-employment 10 years ago. The economic realities have such profound implications that its giving rise to the "sharing economy" http://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2012/09/the-cheapest-generation/309060/ http://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2012/09/the-chea... and changing the way corporations are marketing some of their products to this demographic http://seattletimes.com/html/businesstechnology/2021715711_drivingamericaxml.html# http://seattletimes.com/html/businesstechnology/2021715711_d...! Lots more going on there than meets the eye IMO.

Growing-ups

101 points by timw6n 12y ago

tommo123 12y ago

Surely that should be 'growings-up'? Motion to burn at the stake the author/poster until we reach a conclusion

x3c 12y ago
It's based on grown-ups. So I think, it's correct.

rayiner 12y ago

I don't know if this is a "new" stage of life or rather a return to an earlier way of life. The whole phenomenon of kids leaving the house at 18, moving across the country, and not coming home again is fairly recent and fairly unique to the Western world. My wife and I are "grown ups" in the sense that we both are done with grad school, have professional jobs, and have a kid. Yet, my mom lives with us during the week and we spend nearly every weekend at my parents' house in D.C. Not because they need our support, but because we need theirs'. This is a living situation that wouldn't be unfamiliar to my grandparents back in Bangladesh, where the expectation, back then, was that a young couple would move back into the husband's parents' home after marriage. It's novel relative to what I encountered growing up (in the U.S.), but it's not "new." Various studies have shown that Millenials are closer to their parents than any generation in recent memory. They are not only likely to live with them after graduating college, but turn to them regularly for career advice, take them on job interviews for support. It's the opposite of the rebellious streak that characterized the baby boomers.

aaronem 12y ago
That makes sense; to oversimplify somewhat, the boomers tended to be really crap as parents, resulting in a generation (my generation, more or less) who are absolutely adamant that they won't inflict the same on their own kids. This seems to have resulted in a close and strongly nurturing, if at times somewhat smothering, parenting style, which in turn gave rise to the millennials, who seem by and large to have much stronger family ties than their parents' generation does. (By the way, I'm a member of the "moved across the country at 18 and never looked back" cohort, and I've occasionally had reason to wish I weren't; by placing myself far beyond any distance at which I could reasonably hope to receive the support of my family, I set myself up to blow a scholarship and drop out of school half a semester in. I've managed to make my way in the world reasonably well despite that, and have no real reason to be dissatisfied with my lot, but it certainly gives useful perspective on some of my fellows' declamations of narcissism and selfishness on the part of the generation following ours -- if I'd had some of that "narcissism" and "selfishness" when I was young, I'd have a doctorate now.)
- seanccox 12y ago
  That's an interesting observation. I had thought it was really more the result of the prevailing economic conditions, rather than the result of a strong, nurturing relationship. These are hypotheses that I would really like to see tested, that way I know whether to blame parents for causing economic crisis, or for babying their children (j/k).
  - maxerickson 12y ago
    It's interesting to look at the one time events that have happened in the last few (or several) generations. The destruction of farming/agriculture as the primary source of employment and the post war boom would be two big ones. I think the change in agriculture is interesting here because the decision making process for the child of a (relatively poor) farmer wouldn't have been very involved, they would be quite likely to do what they knew. There would also probably be quite some pressure on them to get to it. The post war boom is interesting because there were substantial opportunities for every single 18 year old that went looking for them. That's probably still reasonably true today, but the opportunities are at least riskier (in a life trajectory sense) than getting a good paying job at a mill or factory.
    - randomdata 12y ago
      Great point about agriculture. Fortunately, telecommuting enabled me to stay on the farm, which couldn't support me by itself. Had I been born a decade earlier, moving away to a populous area would have been an almost certainty. If you have to move away from your family, the risk is already high, so what's a little more? Now, the vast majority of the population already live in urban areas, so we are back to not having to move very far from your family.
      - maxerickson 12y ago
        I didn't say much about it, but part of what I was thinking about is that someone who has had the experience of picking from many choices is probably going to give better advice to a child doing the same thing than someone who had one path that was quite clear. (Which isn't contrary to anything you said, it's just another factor)
chanced 12y ago
> [Millenials] take [their parents] on job interviews for support No wonder my generation can't get a damn job.
- aaronem 12y ago
  I missed that bit the first time through. That seems to me to fall well on the wrong side of the line between "strong family ties" and "just plain not equipped to cope".
pawelk 12y ago
> The whole phenomenon of kids leaving the house at 18, moving across the country, and not coming home again is fairly recent and fairly unique to the Western world. I live in Poland and I'm the first generation that grew up after the fall of communism. I have seen this transition first-hand. I grew up in a multi-generation home with my grandparents and parents sharing the same space. I have left at 19 to another city, but some of my family members have stayed and there are four generations living in the house right now. My parents share a floor with my mother's dad, my father's mom and my brother (in his twenties). On another floor lives my mom's sister with her family (husband, daughter and daughter's children). Houses built to accommodate two or three generations were common even 30 years ago. Many people, especially in small towns and villages have built huge houses with the assumption that each of their kids will stay there and needs a floor of their own. Then, suddenly, so many things have changed. We can - or have to - work abroad, or move halfway across the country to study and then find a job. Many of those large houses are so sad right now with just a couple of elder people using two rooms and the kitchen with hundreds of square meters of empty space, sometimes filled with stuff left behind by their children who can't take it all with them to their studio apartments. I don't know of anyone from my generation who would event think of building a house with their future kids and grandchildren in mind. But I think we're trading an important aspect of our culture for... I don't know. Money, success, independence, all these western things. I don't think I have a point here, just wanted to share.
- rayiner 12y ago
  As someone with no experience with Poland, that description was fascinating. Thank you for sharing! > I don't know of anyone from my generation who would event think of building a house with their future kids and grandchildren in mind. But I think we're trading an important aspect of our culture for... I don't know. Money, success, independence, all these western things. Maybe somewhat ironically, for my wife and I our living situation has been driven by the pursuit of career success. My wife and I are at the stage of our careers where we're really putting in the hours, and sharing a household with my parents makes life a hundred times easier. We don't have to worry about getting home before the nanny has to go, we don't have to worry about taking a day off when the baby's daycare is closed. We come home to a hot meal. Meanwhile, my parents are thrilled to be so actively invoked in their granddaughter's life.

pawn 12y ago

I wonder how much variation there is between different cultures. I don't have a lot of context to go off of myself, but speaking to some of my Indian friends, it seems more prevalent in their culture to stay with your parents until you're married rather than running off while you're still single.

srs0001 12y ago
Although this is genuinely a positive article about young people, I feel that pulling conclusions about all 18 to 29-year-olds is painting with a broad stroke.

mml 12y ago

Many "emerging adults", in my limited experience, eventually transition into the "desperately poor" category when they run out of other peoples' money. I'm going to go shake my cane and yell at clouds now.

chanced 12y ago
Yelling at clouds is the best, especially if you have a cane handy.

ekpyrotic 12y ago

It wouldn't be too hard to argue that the Baby Boomers are strange. Not Gen X, Y and Z. Until the 1950s, young people in the west were expected to live with their parents until they married and settled down. Just crack open a Victorian novel. (A few HNers have noted that this is true in India, China and Japan; but it was also true in the west.) This changed all at one and all of a sudden under the Baby Boomers. Young people left home earlier, travelled the world, experimented with drugs. Let's forget that the Baby Boomers were responsible for psychedelia, the protest movement and flower power. Here's what I'm saying: The Baby Boomers were a blip, premeditated by the astronomical rise of the USA in the global economy. Money and jobs were everywhere all of a sudden, endowing people (and especially young people) with the new freedom to experiment. Something that is not true now: We're facing increased global competition from the East and the west's manufacturing base has been hollowed out. In terms of global and Western culture they were a non-stereotypical blip, the result of very particular and unusual economic and social conditions, a few flicks of the second hand on the our cultural watch. So, are the Baby Boomers justified in criticising this generation for returning to former cultural values and habits? Personally, I don't think so. It's hard not to feel it smacks of myopia, of judging others through the wrong side of the binoculars.

HNJohnC 12y ago
Um...who do you think raised these Gen X, Y and Z people? Perhaps they were raised badly?
jamesbritt 12y ago
This changed all at one and all of a sudden under the Baby Boomers. Young people left home earlier, travelled the world, experimented with drugs. Let's forget that the Baby Boomers were responsible for psychedelia, the protest movement and flower power. I'm puzzled how people can make generalizations about a group people born over a range of 18 years. While the notion of "generation <foo>" is dubious in itself, claiming that someone born in 1946 has a whole lot in common with someone born in 1964 seems especially silly. What I've found is most people, when talking about "boomers", really mean the subset of those who might have plausibly attended the first Woodstock festival.

noelwelsh 12y ago

Only had time to skim the article, but the section on work caught my eye. Like a lot of people I was fairly dissatisfied with my early career, but, luckily, as a programmer my job had some future prospects worth obtaining. I now really like what I do, and I've learned a bit about the nature of work. A few things come to mind: 0. The more competent you are at something, the more interesting it becomes. Expecting your first job to be interesting is setting yourself up for disappointment. 1. Autonomy, at least for me, is really important. 2. Nobody hires someone else to do the most interesting work available. 3. The best jobs aren't advertised. Visibility, or self-promotion, is important to some degree. The awesome thing about computing is the capital costs are so low you can short circuit a lot of the career progression. You'll probably still make a mess of your first N years, which is why venture capital was invented ;-)

samatman 12y ago
Perhaps I was fortunate in my career choices, but #2 is not my experience. Plenty of people are hiring for problems they don't fully understand and can't solve, or they wouldn't be hiring. Often enough, those are the interesting problems.

pistle 12y ago

You now what this article needs? More cowbell! I mean graphs! This is a social phenomenon being critiqued using self-reported social scoring without tying it back to either theoretical or applied economic models. If large swaths are asked fairly banal "Will you get what you want out of life?" questions with waaaaaay more rigorous subjective and practical analysis a bigger picture can't be assessed. Elders "ridiculing," which is really a cynical take on what people older than adult children are doing, are expressing some insight into the pitfalls of delayed productive income acquisition. This article also flies in the face of trends that HN loves. We've seen articles questioning and advocating against ageism, as if this was somehow unique to HN-fields of interest. Whether it is pop music, high art, math, or technology (or many other fields), the people who "make a difference" and live those envious lives of freedom to walk the path to becoming all-stars in their field and/or lives... those are young people. Sure, some fields require great levels of extended experience or knowledge only acquirable through time, but the people getting everything out of life most frequently start early with a passionate drive for exactly what they will become. The ascendant efforts of the young from about 18-30 is vital, innovative, and disruptive. I dislike the "disrupt everything!" mantra that leads the naive into the ditch. Fail fast can easily lead to lost opportunities to establish strong financial and technical (or creative) foundations that enable the later bloomers their time in the sun. It's tough at the top and there are only so many who can get there now or ever. For the rest, it's best to be able to get productive to start saving early to establish a life where you can get ENOUGH out of life to not hit some anxious or depressive state later when you see doors closing to attaining EVERYTHING. It's efficient to be able to minimize suffering as you go versus rolling the dice that you will suddenly find a calling later. Feast upon life to learn everything you can. Deconstruct suffering and you'll find ways big and small to constantly create a life that you wouldn't trade for some amorphous "everything." The destination (goals) is usually only a milestone in the journey you are already engaged in. "If you don't stop to look around once in a while, you might miss it."

rayiner 12y ago
> The ascendant efforts of the young from about 18-30 is vital, innovative, and disruptive. It's important, but if you look out your window, the world that exists out there was designed and built mostly by people over 30. There are some geniuses that were most prolific in their 20's (Einstein's miracle year was at 26), but most people who are awarded the nobel prize do their most important work from 30-50 (http://www.nature.com/news/2011/111107/full/news.2011.632.html http://www.nature.com/news/2011/111107/full/news.2011.632.ht...). Picasso started developing cubism around the age of 30, Braque at about the same time. The young have particular relevance in the area of entertainment (pop music, Facebook), largely because so much entertainment is targeted at the young. They also have particular importance in the area of mathematics. But the kind of day-to-day innovation that makes the world go around is a process of stepping on the shoulders of those who came before. And it's experienced people who understand what came before who do that most efficiently.

taybin 12y ago

Let me know when they have a spouse, child, and mortgage. That's the dividing line, as far as I can tell.

nileshtrivedi 12y ago
What precisely is it about having a child and having a mortgage that qualifies someone as "grown-up"? (I'm speaking as someone who has a wife, a kid and a house bought outright).
- bjelkeman-again 12y ago
  It brings things which are considered grown-up sharply into focus. Nothing seems to encourage bringing home some money for food and housing like a child or two. At least that is my interpretation.
- declan 12y ago
  >What precisely is it about having a child and having a mortgage that qualifies someone as "grown-up"? It's shorthand for assuming adult responsibilities. It's difficult to survive on your emotionally fulfilling but minimum wage job if you have a brood in diapers at home. Obviously you still have responsibilities, probably including property taxes, insurance, and utilities, if you own your house outright as opposed to having a mortgage. BTW, it's a bit tricky to buy your home outright if you live, in, say Palo Alto, where I recall a bunch of YC-funded startups are based: http://www.paloaltoonline.com/news/2013/12/24/real-estate-matters http://www.paloaltoonline.com/news/2013/12/24/real-estate-ma... "In Palo Alto the median sales price for a home was $2.2 million..."
  - nileshtrivedi 12y ago
    I understand that IF you have a spouse or kids, it's your responsibility to take care of them and provide the best possible environment for them to flourish. But it does not follow that it's one's responsibility to marry and have kids. There have been plenty of people who contributed a lot to society without ever marrying or raising kids. You're right that managing a family is shorthand for being responsible. My point is: why use a shorthand when you can simply ask "So what are you doing with all the extra time you get because of not having a family?". Ask, don't presume. (I am not even getting into the whole philosophical debate of whether "work == virtue". The subtext in comments like the above is: "Oh, you're living a comfortable life with no responsibilities? You should work hard and suffer like the rest of us!" )

jimbokun 12y ago

"Adulthood is full of onerous responsibilities, as all of us who have been there for a while know well: going to work every day, making the meals, keeping the household reasonably clean and orderly, paying the bills." That's the bar for onerous, now? And this is an attitude we, as parents and as society, are obligated to encourage, support, and indulge?

bluemnmtattoo 12y ago
But if there's no point to all of it, then there's no point That's not attitude that's science Space exploration is the point

diegomcfly 12y ago

If you are an "emerging adult" at age 30, then there is a problem. Further, the author of this article claiming that these so called "emerging adults" are not lazy or self-entitled is ridiculous. It is clearly a case of "first world problems". The mere fact that these "emerging adults" have the luxury of living "on the dole" (whether parental or governmental) while they "figure out what they want to do with their lives" into their late 20s and early 30s is a clear case of self-entitlement. If you don't have a place to live, food to eat, and shelter ... you "emerge" as an adult pretty quickly and figure out what you "want to do with your life" by DOING WORK you don't want to do to get said food, and shelter (i.e., to survive). What is the saying? An absence of alternatives clears the mind marvelously.

invalidOrTaken 12y ago
"...But follow your dreams!"
UK-AL 12y ago
Most survival work like that doesn't pay that well, so you would not be able to get shelter, food etc anyway. A large majority of professional jobs in business, programming, accountancy, consultancy are filled with people who want to be there. I am in a professional job, and I doubt I could afford a decent place to live without parental help other than a crappy flat in a dodgy area. How people afford to live by themselves, on non-professional jobs I don't know.
- diegomcfly 12y ago
  >I am in a professional job, and I doubt I could afford a decent place to live without parental help other than a crappy flat in a dodgy area. Then live in a the "crappy flat in a dodgy area". >How people afford to live by themselves, on non-professional jobs I don't know. Then don't live by yourself. I had 2 and 3 roommates over various times as a young person getting started. We split the rent in crappy small apartments.
mtrimpe 12y ago
We're moving from investing ~20 years into children into investing ~30 years into children. Makes perfect sense given how the world had been changing...

Beasting247 12y ago

This article takes way too long to get to the point. Can I get the Cliff-Notes?

diegomcfly 12y ago
Yes .. here you go: The article is about the self-entitled generation of "emerging adults" (apparently who range from 18 to 40) of which the author was a part of, but now spends his time writing long-winded articles rationalizing how they (he) are not lazy and self-entitled.

pnathan 12y ago

> They expect work to be fun, and if it’s not fun, they refuse to do it. That is a big difference and a good way to sum it up. Unfortunately, lots of jobs are both needed and full of drudgery.

dropit_sphere 12y ago
>Unfortunately, lots of jobs are both needed and full of drudgery. I get the feeling millennials are calling that bluff: "If it's so needed, why won't they hire me for it/why doesn't it pay more?'
- pnathan 12y ago
  * why won't they hire me for it Because "you" got a humanities degree and "it" is a tradesperson job which does not "make the world better". "You" chose to pursue "fun and interesting", and didn't run the numbers on "ROI", which only geeks, low-class people, and in-it-for-the-money people did. * why doesn't it pay more? Because experience counts a tremendous amount, far more than willingness to show up. /me shrug A lot of tradespeople jobs are done by immigrants willing to work many hours with low pay where natives are out looking for "rewarding" and "fulfilling" work. The Great Hand of Bettering Yourself By Hard Work will sort it out, more or less, more or less unevenly, in the end.
  - dropit_sphere 12y ago
    Fine---but if the jobs are being done, why all the whining about "kids these days?"
    - mason240 12y ago
      Because "kids these days" are refusing to do them, yet demanding they have better lifestyle then the people who are doing them.
  - ameister14 12y ago
    I don't think either of those answers is correct. Bettering yourself with hard work is a religious notion. It's not necessarily true, but it's good for people that own things that need to be worked on, like farmland. It keeps people working. If the jobs are necessary, though, they should be paid with that in mind. They are not. Manufacturing production is up, but wages are stagnant. I don't think it's entitlement that makes people recognize that. Most people that now trust in 'The Great Hand of Bettering Yourself By Hard Work' as you put it will be out of a job in 30 years; we've already started that trend.

bicx 12y ago

This is interesting to me because my brother and I (both in our later twenties), ended up taking two different paths. I knew what I wanted to do since high school (software engineering), unwaveringly pursued my 4-year degree with solid scholarships, got a good job the day after I graduated, and bought a house at 25 with a decent down-payment. My brother, on the other hand, did not have that kind of luck. He tinkered around in college, then joined the Navy. After a couple years, he was discharged early (but honorably) due to panic attacks while attempting one of their most difficult programs. Now he's back at my parents' house as he pursues his degree in environmental science (the closest thing he could think of that matched his interests) at a community college. My family noticed he seemed a bit depressed as his 25th birthday approached last month. Turns out he was pretty upset that at 25, he hadn't gotten anywhere in life. I feel sorry for him because he's compared to me. I am not a better person. I just have a more studious, middle-of-the-road demeanor, and I know what I want to pursue. There was no moment where I was like, "Man, I need to settle down and pick a career." It just happened, and I was blessed enough to have had a straight path to the "American dream." My brother isn't in that stage of emerging adulthood by choice. He wants to be viewed as a respectable adult. It's just that he was not gifted with well-defined, lucrative goals, and he doesn't want to do something he hates simply for a good paycheck. I wouldn't have either. It just worked out better for me, and now I look like I have my shit together.

sbilstein 12y ago
I feel the same way. My success as a programmer is some combination of luck and hard work, but it'd be unfair to judge others based on the kind of luck I've had. I was lucky to have been exposed to computing at an early age, stumble upon source code for qbasic games, like programming, major in it, and happen to have my graduation date align with a huge period of growth in our industry. Good luck magnifies the effect of hard work, bad luck can make it appear non-existent.
- bicx 12y ago
  Definitely. When I started my degree, it was during a time when everyone was worried that all IT-related were going to India. However, I chose CS anyway because I enjoyed it. I just lucked out. The industry has been booming, my LinkedIn account blows up with recruiter emails, and I traded my stuffy corporate job for a startup position with a work environment heavily weighted toward employee comfort. I get into work at 10am wearing shorts and a t-shirt, and somehow I'm still a responsible adult. It's ridiculous. Hard work definitely helped, but I was also at the right place at the right time.

morgante 12y ago

I really hate this term "emerging adults." Suddenly we're not full adults anymore, just because many people of my generation have failed to live up to the standard of adulthood? I really hope this isn't a trend/term which catches on and justifies continued ageism or the denial of rights. In general, I've always hated these "generational" descriptions. They're guaranteed to be woefully inaccurate for many people in the generation, yet provide ammunition for ageists to discriminate against young people. For my part, I haven't lived at home since I was 17 and, at 21, have a very "serious" job (which definitely pays the bills). I'm certainly not an outlier in this regard. The people who fail to do this are simply that: failures. (Though that failure isn't necessarily their fault.) Where does this fit in his theory of extended adolescence and infantilization?

sho_hn 12y ago
> The people who fail to do this are simply that: failures. Yup, sounds 21 to me. Quick to anger and lash out, quick to judge, moral certitude, and lack of empathy. For one, there's significant variance to how family units function across the human population. In many parts of the world, living together for far longer than 17 is the norm, and the model of how one generation financially supports the next, or families co-manage/pool their finances, works very differently. Often systems emerge that entrench this (e.g. the massive up-front down payments on rental apartments in the South Korean retail markets, which kids simply cannot afford because there's no time to make that kind of money). So blanket statements like this reek of cultural superiority and lack of education, frankly. I get that you're pissed because you don't feel you're getting the respect you deserve for your accomplishments (or at least that's what I seemed to read there), but starting with some humility and respect for others might change how people respond to you. (And yeah, I was financially self-sufficient at 21, too. Big deal. It's possible because I happened to enjoy doing work in an area and market that allowed for it. Many things worth pursueing, and of great contribution to society, don't make you money at 21.)
- omni 12y ago
  > The people who fail to do this are simply that: failures. (Though that failure isn't necessarily their fault.) Did you just omit the second sentence so you could go on a little rant? Or did morgante edit his post?

johnnyg 12y ago

"I made enough to live on, but only because I had moved back home with my parents and didn’t have to pay for rent or groceries." No, no you didn't.

bradleysmith 12y ago
had the same thought at this line. The use of 'to live on' while not paying rent or groceries is very strange. These are the EXACT two bills I think of when I think of the base costs 'to live'.

ashleyjohn 12y ago

Interesting topic. It seems that every generation has something to criticize about the next. I'm sure that the Greatest Generation who witnessed both World War I, World War II and the Great Depression had a few words (critiques) about the Baby Boomers...just as the Baby Boomers have a few words about Generation Z (the Internet Generation)...

johnrob 12y ago

Much of the author's analysis is lacking economic perspective. In particular, I'd argue that a large contributor to 20 somethings with 'dead end' jobs is the obvious lack of 'real' jobs. Additionally, giving everyone a college degree is not going to magically place everyone on career paths - it will probably just debunk the assumed correlation between college degrees and careers by sinking all of the "x percent of college grads" stats.

MattyRad 12y ago

When I was a child, I asked my dad if his work was fun. He said, "If it was fun, they wouldn't pay you." I remember that from time to time, because it's true. Something that is fun (relative though "fun" is) doesn't warrant payment. When my mom asks about my current job, I sometimes repeat that phrase, and she gets all huffy and annoyed that I don't view my current job as enjoyable. Sure, my job is satisfying in small ways, but ultimately I'd rather be doing something else. I just mention it because my mom and dad show two sides of the generation mentality discussed in the article: the "buckle down and get a job" type, and the "you should do what you love" type.

r00fus 12y ago
Interesting how your parents have such archetypal responses. I kind of feel that it's "they're both right" but to go meta here, it's really a question of "what would motivate me to be a productive employee?". For some, it's respect in the terms of compensation. For others the reward needs to be from within (in addition to external compensation). From a management point of view, this is instructive - each employee is different and have different (vector of) motivations.

trustfundbaby 12y ago

I think that economic variables also play an very strong role in what we're seeing with delayed adulthood in millenials. Credit is much harder to come by, jobs are more difficult to get without a college education (addressed in the article), and there are also changing attitudes to sex and relationships that are becoming more pronounced with millenials (specifically casual sex/relationships) that make it easier for men (probably women as well) to put off marriage and having children. WRT to credit, when I got out of college back in 2003, I got a credit card with a $5000 limit in my mailbox which I started using immediately, I was talking to my brother who graduated last year and he says that those credit card offers are few and far between now, and that even when you get your hands on one, the credit limit is about $1000 ..... this blew me away. I couldn't have started my business without that $5000 credit card and much of what I have now revolves around the skills/experience I gained from my initial self-employment 10 years ago. The economic realities have such profound implications that its giving rise to the "sharing economy" http://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2012/09/the-cheapest-generation/309060/ http://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2012/09/the-chea... and changing the way corporations are marketing some of their products to this demographic http://seattletimes.com/html/businesstechnology/2021715711_drivingamericaxml.html# http://seattletimes.com/html/businesstechnology/2021715711_d...! Lots more going on there than meets the eye IMO.