klaus
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Jan 26, 2011, 2:51 PM
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I have a friend who is nearing retirement age and he is considering selling his large home and downsizing to a more manageable space. There’s a small wrinkle in that my friend’s 42 year-old son is still living in the family home and he isn’t particularly eager to relocate. And who can blame him? He’s not paying rent; he isn’t contributing to the grocery fund; his mother does his laundry and he’s able to have girlfriends visit for extended periods of time. The last one stayed over 8 months.
Granted, this is an extreme case, but more and more the offspring of baby boomers are reluctant to strike out on their own and elect instead to mooch off mom and dad for as long as possible. I have often told my friend (in the gentlest way possible) that he is totally out of his mind to have a 42 year-old offspring still living “at home.” Not only that, he really isn’t doing the kid any favors in allowing him to stave off maturity to the degree that he can live like a teenager well into middle age.
This trend of extending adolescence is one that seems to be encouraged in Western society across a broad range of national and cultural groups. In Europe it isn’t uncommon for men and women in their 20s and 30s to be enrolled in university working toward an undergraduate degree. It’s somewhat ironically comical, when one considers that many Europeans tend to retire at a relatively early age. So if an individual doesn’t enter the workforce until well into his or her 40s, then an illustrious career is unlikely, given that retirement is barely more than 15 years away.
The U.S. is also guilty of officially extending adolescence, as is evidenced by the Obama Administration’s mandate that insurance with dependent coverage be expanded to cover “children” up to age 26. What’s more the State Children’s Health Insurance programs (S-CHIP) in the United States cover individuals deemed “low income children” up to age 26. In many cases those covered under these programs are neither low income nor children.
In some perverse way, extending adolescence well into the adult years makes economic sense, particularly in an economy that’s less than buoyant. But a deeper, more serious truth is that extending adolescence isn’t really doing anyone any favors (except maybe politicians who see this as a strategy to fudge the unemployment numbers). It delays an individual’s entry into adulthood and self-reliance and reduces the number of productive years that individual will have to help attain a secure and healthy retirement.
The days when young men lied about their age to join the armed forces or the merchant marine are long gone. This generation appears much more comfortable clinging to adolescence by grasping at every shred of dependence at hand. Even if it means that they are keeping their parents from moving into a smaller and less expensive home to begin enjoying their retirement.
Klaus Rohrich is President and Creative Director of Taylor/Rohrich Associates Inc., a marketing and advertising firm that specializes in niche marketing retirement real estate developments
http://www.maturitymarketing.com.
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