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42% of adults rely on their parents for financial support

cnbc.com

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Re: 42% of adults rely on their parents for financial support

#41

Post by PaulDavisThe1st »

snovymgodym wrote: post #14

The figure might be misleading. It might not be. Either way, the idea that the natural and normal state of affairs is that every person can go out into the world and be a perfectly self sufficient but comfortable atomized economic unit without support from their family or society is deeply flawed. This wasn't the norm for most of human history, and it isn't the norm globally today.

It might, however, be a nice thing to aspire to, no? Economic self-sufficiency doesn't have to imply atomization, I think.

Re: 42% of adults rely on their parents for financial support

#42

Post by cliglot »

How you define “rely”.

I’ve certainly seen trust fund kids who’s success is anchored on “daddy gave me a sweet job at his company” and others who’d be dead or in prison if it wasn’t for the constant money poured into the legal system by their parents.

Re: 42% of adults rely on their parents for financial support

#43

Post by vondur »

snovymgodym wrote: post #14

The figure might be misleading. It might not be. Either way, the idea that the natural and normal state of affairs is that every person can go out into the world and be a perfectly self sufficient but comfortable atomized economic unit without support from their family or society is deeply flawed. This wasn't the norm for most of human history, and it isn't the norm globally today.

Look at the comment above, the sample is from really wealthy parents, not the median income in the US, so I'm sure that skews the data.

Re: 42% of adults rely on their parents for financial support

#45

Post by PaulDavisThe1st »

burningChrome wrote: post #37
anthonypasq wrote: post #3

I think the word "rely" is doing some heavy lifting here. Still being on your parent's family phone plan doesnt mean youd be destitute if they werent helping you out.

>> Still being on your parent's family phone plan doesnt mean youd be destitute if they werent helping you out. I think there's some important things like this that should be considered. In the late 90's early aughts, I didn't need a laptop, smartphone and 24/7 internet access with 1GB download speeds or half the technological stuff kids need these days to be a contributing member of society. Now those are all standa…

> $350/month [ 2000 ]

> $1500/month [ 2026 ]

CPI inflation would suggest that the current cost ought to be about $692. So if it really costs $1500 to cover the things you've mentioned (noticeabley absent: student loans, health insurance, car payments) then either our society is deeply fucked or your list has changed or your estimates are wrong or your memory is wrong or all of the above.

Re: 42% of adults rely on their parents for financial support

#46

Post by alwa »

giancarlostoro wrote: post #23
annjose wrote: post #9

Whenever I see a claim that "x% of adults do y", my brain goes: - "x% of what? what is the denominator?". Without that number, the claim is meaningless. - surely it cannot be the entire population, so it has to be a survey. - how many people participated in the survey? what was the distribution? Here is that info for this study. I found this in the PDF version of the study report [0] referred to at the end of the Nor…

> (those with total household investable assets, excluding pensions, retirement plans and property, greater than $1,000,000). Am I reading this wrong, is this about trust fund kids?

You are reading gp’s comment correctly as it was written, but it omits the next line in the source study:

> Data for the general U.S. population (including the High Net Worth oversample) were weighted to Census targets for education, age, gender, race/ethnicity, region and household income.

They oversampled in major markets where they work and in high-net-worth populations (who they service), but their claims are for the overall US adult population.

Oversampling like this is pretty routine in survey research. It improves the precision of any subgroup analyses you might want to do, and, to a first approximation, it doesn’t tend to bias the weighted overall-population claims in one direction or another.

I think about it like Google Earth or something. I happen to have much-higher-res imagery of London than of the Cotswolds. That doesn’t mean my view, when zoomed out to “the whole United Kingdom,” is necessarily misleading. It does mean I can additionally make more detailed claims about Piccadilly Circus than about the sheep fields or whatever.

Re: 42% of adults rely on their parents for financial support

#47

Post by DaSHacka »

nullorempty wrote: post #38

[flagged]

Not a reply I expected to see on HN, but frankly I agree.

I've heard enough "this country doesn't have enough talent!!! We need millions more immigrants to cover the gap!" While almost every recent cybersecurity graduate I know is quite literally UNABLE to find a relevant job, with most resigning to hitting up the employers of jobs they had in HS with low-skill work like wiping down decommissioned K-12 Chromebooks for resale on ebay.

What an absolute waste of their talents.

We obviously have the talent in this country, we're literally the forefront of the field. Employers just prefer a 'subclass' of laborers with less rights (e.g. H1Bs/illegal immigrants that the employer can hold over their head) and lower minimum livable salary compared to regular citizens.

Re: 42% of adults rely on their parents for financial support

#48

Post by PaulDavisThe1st »

piguin wrote: post #30
alistairSH wrote: post #13

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Source: https://news.northwesternmutual.com/planning-and-progress-st... OK, now I'm questioning the whole thing... it also claims 17% of Boomers reliant on their parents. So, we have some substantial number of 62-80 years olds relying on their 90-100 year old parents? Seems unlikely.

Maybe you're not familiar with the entire economy? There are a lot of households that depend on retirement checks of the oldest members and households that don't have traditional work but may have family homes, businesses and farms still in the name of the oldest relatives. Different groups would have different results as far as whether they will inherit independence or become destitute if parents die.

17% of generally retired people are relying on the retirement checks of their parents ? Really ?

Re: 42% of adults rely on their parents for financial support

#49

Post by dclowd9901 »

annjose wrote: post #9

Whenever I see a claim that "x% of adults do y", my brain goes: - "x% of what? what is the denominator?". Without that number, the claim is meaningless. - surely it cannot be the entire population, so it has to be a survey. - how many people participated in the survey? what was the distribution? Here is that info for this study. I found this in the PDF version of the study report [0] referred to at the end of the Nor…

> Whenever I see a claim that "x% of adults do y", my brain goes

Would that everyone employed this level of skepticism before commenting on figures.

Re: 42% of adults rely on their parents for financial support

#50

Post by ironman1478 »

aianus wrote: post #40
AviationAtom wrote: post #28

So if said kids are relying on their parents for support... how are their kids going to rely on them? The idea behind generational wealth is that there is something left to pass down. If you have nothing to pass down, because both you and your parents spent it all, then you're fully on your own to support yourself. Somewhere along the line the bill always comes due.

How so? If you don’t touch the principal you can live off the investment returns forever and so can your descendants.

Health care costs at the end of your life can eat everything you've ever saved and more. Cost of maintenance on housing is increasing and property insurance rates + HOA rates are going up. This idea only works under ideal conditions.
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