171–180 of 432 posts
Sad data. In my opinion this is the result of a culture that optimizes for the wrong things in life. "Happiness is only real when shared.".
The chart seems to say that, as you age, you work less and your children become more independent.
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The Western nuclear family is a very unnatural social arrangement. Anthropologists have found that in most hunter-gatherers, the average infant is held at one point or another by 30+ people in a typical day. The nuclear family has the twin downsides of putting tons of stress on parents of young kids, who shoulder the entire childcare burden, and deprives a lot of grandparents, aunts, cousins, and others of meaningful…
The western nuclear family is exactly what you get in agrarian societies of the past. It wasn't just some random thing the people of the 1950s made up on the spot. When 4/6 of your sons grow to adulthood you can't live in the same household as all of them. You live with one of them (probably the most or least functional one). 2 of the others have their own farms (one probably gets yours, maybe you split your farm bet…
Most places were much closer to equilibrium, with about the same number of people farming a given district from one generation to the next. Something more like 3 adult children, one of whom never has a family, is what you should imagine. And then it's easy to picture multigenerational households being common. As they were, in many (but not all) parts of the world.
This data makes me sad just looking at the parents, children, and coworker lines. This isn't how it should be...
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It's only meddling if you're way too stressed out by trying to keep up with capitalism. If you live a simple life without too much stress then it's not really meddling.
No it’s definitely meddling when you’re 30+ and your mom waltzes into your kitchen and says “Mmmmm are you sure that knife goes in that drawer? And when’s the last time you did the dishes anyway look at this mess”
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However, we have not been hunter gatherers for thousands of years. And we also live healthier and longer lives then they did.
Longer on average, yes, but I highly doubt healthier. I think we'd be in awe of the average health/fitness of a 30 year old hunter gatherer from 100,000 years ago, compared with the average corresponding human in modern times.
This puts me more at ease about choosing to have children later in life. If I wait till late 30s, perhaps then I could push the curve a bit farther toward the end of my useful life, and spend less time alone.
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Unfortunately this is a poor substitute for real physical connection with other people.
Is it that poor? During the pandemic my son has stayed in touch with his friends on the phone in these big group chats and smaller chats as well. I’m amazed at how natural it has become for them. They talk, gossip, play games (Roblox, Fortnite, nba 2k), and even watch YouTube and TikTok together. I think the model they created will persist into post Covid, with the addition of physical connection.
We have more nerves devoted to touch than any other sense. We're a social primate species. We need to shoulders to cry on, hugs, handshakes, etc. We crave being in the same space with others, experiencing their physicality.
Even the smell of our loved ones is an important component of being connected to them. Most of us probably have deeply evocative memories of the smell of "grandmas's house" or an ex's shampoo. Scent is tied to our emotional memories more deeply than any other sense.
What I find interesting is time spent with coworkers. It's about equal to time spent with partner throughout most of adulthood, and it's significantly higher than time spent with friends. Unsurprisingly, time spent with coworkers drops precipitously at retirement age, but perhaps surprisingly, time spent with friends does not then increase to compensate. A lot of people in the comments are talking about children, but…
The post-Covid remote utopia so many seem to be excited about is going to be hard for a lot of workers. Work, lunch, happy hour, bowling, league sports. Now they all have is Slack.
What I find interesting is time spent with coworkers. It's about equal to time spent with partner throughout most of adulthood, and it's significantly higher than time spent with friends. Unsurprisingly, time spent with coworkers drops precipitously at retirement age, but perhaps surprisingly, time spent with friends does not then increase to compensate. A lot of people in the comments are talking about children, but…
Yeah, one way to look at this data is that having kids and working is massively disruptful to maintaining your friend network, but working and parenting are both time limited. When those expire they leave nothing in their absence.
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My mom always said ”Move far away enough that your parents can’t visit in their slippers, trust me you don’t want that kinda meddling” I moved to USA. “Damn it I didn’t mean that far” ~ mom My sister lives with her boyfriend in his mom’s house. There is indeed a ridiculous amount of meddling even though they’re technically separate households.
It's only meddling if you're way too stressed out by trying to keep up with capitalism. If you live a simple life without too much stress then it's not really meddling.