31 minutes ago, SayAgain said:

Absolutely disagree.  Every single one of my friend's coworkers admits their "kids" (Adults) living with them are lazy ... often causes conflict between the parents (oddly it's the male side that seems to be soft).  

 

How many coworkers is that then. Whatever number you give is a miniscule sample size, globally. Not a good idea to generalise based on your coworkers claimed comments.

We can all relate this to our own countries, towns, location. And when we do that in the UK its not laziness. Most youngsters Ive come across (I'm 67) have not been lazy and have been frustrated by the fact that they litteraly CAN'T leave home. They can't leave home because house purchase is impossible, rental is horrendous and buying a house requires an insanely large mortgage they can't afford.

Where I live average house rental for a small one bedroom flat is £1500 per month. Average price to buy a less than impresive two bed house is 600,000. Youngsters obviously can't afford that so have no choice but to stay with their parents.

Now maybe where you come from renting a house or buying a house is dirt cheap and all the kids are lazy. But its certainly not the case from my experience.

The point, is that life is hard, and all it takes is a few disasters and anybody can find themselves on the street. Thus, in my opinion, a youngsters family home should always remain their home, and this be cruel to be kind nonsense, and force em to fend for themselves to build character is quite distasteful. 

 

Edited July 25, 2025Jul 25 by martin-w

13 minutes ago, FPVSteve said:

You sound like the type of guy who'd chuck his kids in the river to see if they can swim.

Hmmm ... I was tossed into a swimming pool age 2 to see if I could swim 🙂  ... I loved it, swam like a fish.  But your reference is way out of context (not life threatening).  Also wasn't suggesting anything about how good or bad your relationship is with your kids. 

I wasn't booted out at 18 either, my options were stay home for free with free meals and go to university (and I had to pay for university, books, fees, etc.) ... OR get booted out if I didn't want to go to university.  I picked university, it was hard, working part-time min wage to pay for university while also doing Tues/Thurs 4 classes a day route and commuting to university.  My part-time min wage job was definitely my motivation to complete my Computer Science and Math degrees with the hope of a good future.  After obtaining the degrees, it was really difficult finding a related job, took on several unrelated jobs that weren't min wage but zig zagged me into a software engineer position eventually (my goal).  It was very hard, so many job interviews and I even had programs published in various computer magazines of the day.

Circling back to the OP's video, I do see a generation of entitled young adults that think they can be hire immediately into a management roll or high paying position.  And the timing seems to be more than just coincidence.  I've had to discipline (usually a performance report that goes to HR) employees many times due to excessive phone interaction not related to work ... and even sleeping on the job ... or one new hire that demanded another employee vacate a shared office so they could take a nap.  I wish I was kidding with these real events, but it's been a sadly reality over the decades. 

 

25 minutes ago, SayAgain said:

 since when has home ownership been something life owes anyone?  It might be a goal for some, not others.  

 

It's not a case of ownership, it's a case of finding somewhere else to live.
Once again, as more of us contribute to this topic, just finding somewhere to live,
whether rental or owned, is proving to be beyond the means of many young people.

 

I'm reluctant to put too much blame social media for the decline in our society, but it has certainly played a role.

When I was 16, my parents told me if I wanted to drive I had to get a part-time job, so I did, and I hated it.  I worked 8 hours on the weekends during school and 24-32 hours a week over the Summer.  Many of my classmates didn't have to do this and got to party more and enjoy their time off. 

I worked part-time and played around for almost a year after I graduated high school, but when I turned 19 my parents told me that I could continue to live at home and not work as long as I went to college full-time, otherwise I would have to get a full-time job and contribute to the household budget.  I really wasn't ready for college and didn't want to live at home, so I joined the military - best decision of my life.

Most teenagers are a bit lazy and aimless, and without proper guidance and sometimes coercion or tough love from responsible parents they can and will go astray.  What I've seen over the past 20 or so years is many parents who coddle and spoil their kids, which has led to a couple of generations of entitled and spoiled adults who want it all without having to work to hard or risk much to get it.  They're into vacation "experiences" and travel nowadays, and many of them can afford to partake in these luxuries because they live with mom and dad so have few expenses.  My wife and I waited many years to be able to travel around in an RV after we retired, so we were surprised to see so many young adults with nicer RVs than ours who decided to take a couple years off and do what we were doing in their 20s and 30s- must be nice.  We also saw many young adults at the beach partying and eating out, many with nice cars, and wondered how in the heck they could afford to do it as rental housing, hotel, and restaurant prices in the area were very high.  Maybe they all had 6-figure salaries from some IT job, but I doubt it.  Most of them are likely in debt up to their eyeballs - just emulating their parents, I guess.  Anyway, I sure couldn't live like that when I was in my 20s and 30s.

Of course, not all of the latest two generations are like this, and we've met a number of them who are polite, smart, motivated, hard-working people, but a significantly higher percentage of them are entitled, spoiled snowflakes than in previous generations.

I primarily blame the parents, as well as the awful dishonest mainstream media, social media, and some bad public policies. 

Dave

 

 

3 minutes ago, martin-w said:

How many coworkers is that then. Whatever number you give is a miniscule sample size, globally. Not a good idea to generalise based on your claimed coworkers comments.

Friends and co-workers, probably about 200 or so ... given the frequency on such a globally small sample set it does seem to emphasize the issue in a few locations over the decades.  But I agree, plenty of 3rd world countries with much more poverty where shared living with family is the ONLY option.

8 minutes ago, martin-w said:

Where I live average house rental for a small one bedroom flat is £1500 per month.

Like I said, my first rental home was shared with 3 people, it what a very old house, not in great shape.  Going it alone, was a studio (no bedroom) in a less than desirable hood.  I didn't have hope of buying a home at that age 22 (61 now) ... that hope came when I built work experience.

One of the best bits of advice I was ever given was, "Always raise your children to be the kind of people you'd want to select your nursing home."

When you get to an age where you can't do everything for yourself, one option is to move in with one of your adult children.  They might be more or less welcoming depending on how you treated them as children and when they turned 18.  Because sometimes, what goes around, comes around.

My wife and I live on 5 acres with two houses.  My son and his wife live in the second house.  I help subsidize his existence and he helps keep me independent.  I consider it a fair trade.

I promised my wife she'd never go into a nursing home.  Her own mother didn't fare well when she had to go when her children couldn't care for her due to her health issues.  My wife is also visually impaired, with deteriorating vision.  She can still take care of herself and me, but her vision won't last forever.  She takes care of me, I take care of her, and my son and his wife take care of both of us.  It's a comfort knowing that after I'm gone, my wife will still be taken care of as long as possible.

I gave up driving over 10 years ago.  My wife never did drive.  We live far out of town, public transportation isn't quite what I'd prefer.

My son has had good jobs, his wife take care of the various livestock with his help.

So far, this has been a fairly good arrangement.  Mostly because we didn't kick my son out when he turned 18.  He turned out to be a good man.  What anyone else does is their decision, but what I did works for us.

Hook

 

5 minutes ago, Reader said:

just finding somewhere to live,
whether rental or owned, is proving to be beyond the means of many young people.

I don't know your location but I do agree there are many locations all over the world where it's not an option.  For example the US ranks 36th globally in education spending as a percent of GDP.  That's a horrible reality given the wealth in this country. 

45 minutes ago, SayAgain said:

Absolutely disagree.  Every single one of my friend's coworkers admits their "kids" (Adults) living with them are lazy ... often causes conflict between the parents (oddly it's the male side that seems to be soft).  

Apartments in my area (Portland OR) go from $1000 to $3000/mo pending location and facilities.  Even if the job is a min wage job, I've had plenty of those during my High School and University days ... current min wage here is $16.30 (this can range from low of $14/hr pending your state).   40 hour week at $33,824 so net around $25,000 yearly.  Shared housing at $1000/mo consumes $12,000 ... $13,000 left over for food, transport, incidentals, insurances (if needed). 

 

Insurance "if needed" lol.  Just don't get sick.  

I made $29k my first job... back in 1996.  My first mortgage payment was $700.  It worked back then, it does not now.  Things cost 3x more, while people make way less than 3x more now.  Your numbers are comically wrong.  Housing may be as high as 4-5x more.  

I worked all those minimum wage jobs, but I had a path out.  A kid making $25k won't ever live in his own house until his parents both pass away.  

Stop talking to people our age and talk to people in their 20s.  

 

Edited July 25, 2025Jul 25 by kerosene31

I certainly agree that the high cost of real estate nowadays precludes many young people from buying a house.  Historically in the USA, people didn't buy their first house until they were in their late 20s to early 30s, but now it's become late 30s to early 40s.  

However, two or three people can rent a place together and afford the payments.  I had friends who did this fresh out of high school.  What most kids over the past 20 years have done is go to college for 4 or 5 years and party it up while paying for it with government-provided student loans.  Then when they graduate they move right back in with their parents until they get the perfect dream job.

It's probably not as easy to get out on your own nowadays as it used to be 25 years ago as the cost of living has gone up so much in such a short time (I know who to blame for this, but can't discuss it here - hint: it starts with a big "G").  Nevertheless, young adults must be motivated to get a job they may not like even if they continue to live at home. 

Factories in the USA are having difficulty finding workers.  We're talking about pretty good paying jobs here, but most young people don't want them.

Dave

 

7 minutes ago, kerosene31 said:

Your numbers are comically wrong.

https://www.zillow.com/portland-or/studio-apartments/

$1000 to $1500 ... and these are NICE studios, much better than the Studio I first moved into at $750/mo circa 1988.

Oregon minimum wage:

https://www.oregon.gov/boli/workers/pages/minimum-wage.aspx

where am I comically wrong?

Agree, fortunately I was young so getting sick wasn't common (certainly not hospitalization).

7 minutes ago, kerosene31 said:

A kid making $25k won't ever live in his own house

Agree, that the kid needs to become an Adult and get an education and get a better paying job.

Edited July 25, 2025Jul 25 by SayAgain

3 minutes ago, dave2013 said:

I certainly agree that the high cost of real estate nowadays precludes many young people from buying a house.  Historically in the USA, people didn't buy their first house until they were in their late 20s to early 30s, but now it's become late 30s to early 40s.  

However, two or three people can rent a place together and afford the payments.

Agree, I waited until my mid 30's (in CA).  Shared rentals and tiny studio and old car and rarely able to save $100/mo.  How I got out of that situation is by working early, getting experience, and climbing the ladder ... not by waiting for parental assistance (which they could have easily done, but didn't because value, discipline, motivation were priority installments to my character that would have helped me achieve my goals).  They wanted me to have "my life" not their life (WWII survivors from German invasion) ... it wasn't about them.

 

I joined the military at age 23 on my third attempt (long story) for armor school.  Re-enlisted for computer programmer school.  Was able to get good jobs when I got out with 3 years programming experience.

My family wouldn't hear of me going to a trade school.  I might have started my programming career 8 years earlier if I'd been allowed.

I realized I'd found my life's calling a week into programmer school in the Army.  I am thankful I found something I loved, and never hated going to work every day.  The money was good, too.

Looking back, I'm glad I did it the way I did.  I had some incredible experiences.

My second attempt to join was for helicopter pilot.  Didn't pass the physical.  The colonel in charge of things "lost" my paperwork, paving the way for my success on my third attempt.  Probably all for the best, as what would my chances have been of surviving Viet Nam in a helicopter?

Hook

37 minutes ago, SayAgain said:

where am I comically wrong?

 

Your entire premise is wrong.  You're ignoring or leaving off tons of living expenses.  Insurance, food, car, all that and saving a few bucks for the future?  Saying someone can live off of what we did back in the 90s is wrong.  $25,000 a year in 2025?  Come on, that's not even marginally realistic.  

This is the narrative us older people are fed.  This is what the rich people feed us to make us feel better about ourselves.  

Like I said, talk to younger people.  Kids skip the minimum wage jobs, because they can make more doing gig work like uber or door dash.  Moving up the ladder?  What ladder?  

I'm not one of these kids, I'm one of the older guys who had it easy.  My student loans?  Paid off in a couple years with scholarships.  House?  Year 1.  1st year was lean, but I made it.  No roomates, no "wait until 30".  

Today, I don't know if I could afford to live where I do without owning my home already.  My house is 4x the value easily.  That means a kid needs at least 3x as much to even have a chance (and that's thin).  

Edited July 25, 2025Jul 25 by kerosene31

Another perfect example.  Remember when you could put money in a savings account and make money?

That's gone now.  Where did that go?  Remember Warren Buffet telling everyone to save their pennies?

 

 

If I were to give advice to someone starting out in today's workforce:

1.  When interviewing for a job, besides worrying about what the pay is....ask about what medical benefits
     are offered, is there a pension plan offered, or a 401K plan.  If a 401K is offered, then put in the max you
     can.  If no 401K, then start your own IRA account.

2.  After finding a job...Make sure you have a bill paying checking account and I highly recommend finding 
     a certified financial planner who is also a fiduciary.  This means they will have only your best interest in
     mind.  Most will not charge a fee for their service.  They make their money from what they invest you in.

3.  Unless you are married and maybe have children...don't worry about having Life Insurance.  Good
     Medical coverage is far more important.  Accidents do happen!

Happy P O E T S day! 😉