O.K, so I'm what is referred to as a " Baby Boomer ".. Was fully expected to move out of the house and start my life 2 days after high school. Then we have the "Gen X" age group that started out kinda slow but are out having kids and raising them etc. Yesterdays slackers are doing O.K by and large.

However, anyone notice that this current crop of kids tend to live at home forever, be happy to make very little money, pay zero bills and pretty much sit an their asses at their parents houses ???

I was talking with a guy about this and he says the are calling it the " Age of entitlement ". Kids who have always had everything you can imagine, have no clue what it took to get it, no real idea of how money is made.

So I'm wondering if my dad felt the same way about things, or this really is true. All I know is my son starts his second year of college, has never paid for anything in his life, and every single one of his friends all still live at home and suck mom's boob for money.

Yeah. That's the Gen. Y (Why).

These are ther kids that have never known anything but CD's, computers, TiVo, DVD Players etc. To them typewriters and vinyl records are like freakish relics of ancient times.

In my estimation 99% of these tools are late in life babies from the baby boomers that were too "cool" to settle down back in the 60's and 70's and have children during their 20's and 30's when people are supposed to because Mommy was "career oriented" or some other such baby-boomer devised new speak bullschit used to describe baby boomer self absorbedness... The result is, these kids have been raised by semi-dottards on prescription mood pills that got their parenting skills from a pop-psychology book at Barnes & Noble and generally pretty F'ed up.

Just my $0.02.

Coffee hasn't kicked in yet.

Had my boys working on our property yesterday.

Ryan picked up mails at 10 cents a pop, and made $7.40 for two hours work, then he back filled a slip trench for the silt fence I installed for another hour and earned $5 more. He's 9.

Hunter used the field mower (push behind DR Field mower clone) and mowed 3 acres. Had him correct the few mohawks and it looks great! Once he was done there, he helped me on the silt fence, and earned $12.50 for the day. He's 12. Ask Hunter at any time how much money he has, and he'll tell you.

They have also both been honor role students from Kindergarten on. Open up a conversation with Hunter, age 12, and he'll talk with you as an equal, not child to adult.

It is all about the parent, not the kid. Irie is right. If the parents guide the kids as far as what needs to be done, plus the why and how, the kids will do just fine. Too many time I see folks either not make their kids a priority, or they coddle them too much. The kids will turn out fine if the parent does their job and actually "parents" the kids. Push your kids to excel, and they will, but you don't have to go over board. Sometimes it is good to push your kid until he cries, and then show them how to overcome the challenge.

If this continues we'll maintain our slide downhill as we become a nation of even bigger pussies.

I agree. The parents are to blame, not the kids... There's no incentive for kids who have everything handed to em.

For those families that had beans over toast for 2 nights, and chili for the next 3 nights. Or powdered milk for cereal...

You won't have to worry about those kids. They'll be just fine. lol

Mf

DING! DING! DING!

Maybe you should quit the coffee Irie, that was brilliant!
I couldn't agree more.

A lot of this "entitlement" is a result of the breakdown of the marriage and not always those that end in divorce. The parents aren't on the same page on how to raise their children. I have several friends that are married, but the wives have declared that the son doesn't have to follow in the same footsteps of the father in their upbringing. The sons don't have to experience working in the yard, help cut firewood, bale hay, any chores, etc. They don't have to work and are given anything they desire. Often these fathers want their sons to experience hiking, hunting, or fishing, and the son says no thanks and the moms back the son up. Sometimes those boys need to get up at 4:00 am and experience the outdoors, even if just once.

As a divorced father(more than once) and a step-father(more than once), I've seen the mom go to the extreme to allow the child to do anything or get anything they want(to gain favor from the child) while the divorced father hopelessly tries to "parent" the child from a distance. Tough times.

My son is a good kid, almost 21 and lives with me at home while attending college(top student) and working nearly full-time. He pays for his own car insurance and bought his own car and has his own spending money. I pay his tuition and obviously his room and board. He helps out around the house(not as much as I would like, but he does help). It balances out okay............and he enjoys fishing with me, too.

There has to be a contribution by both the child and parent. I didn't want him to go at life completely on his own like I did. When I went to college my father flipped me a quarter and said "don't use it to call home and ask for money". I put myself through college.

B-run,

I'm also about as Baby Boomer as one can get, born 48, graduated high school 67. Yeah, there seems to be a lot of entitlement or apparent trust fund babies these days, but I think they're just more noticeable than those who make it on their own. My kids grew up sorta' like Andy's are, only I had two daughters. They've been able to have pretty much anything they've had the initiative to work for. I never insisted they have part time jobs during the school year; I figured their job was to attend school and do as well as they could. My attitude was probably because I worked almost full time from age 15 and had to forego most sports that I would have preferred to participate in.

The girls were bored with school until they had honors and advanced placement course opportunities in high school. Their public school educations paid off with admissions to private colleges and universities. I couldn't afford it, but their hard work earned scholarships, grants, and loans to attend Smith, Stanford, Wesleyan, and Berkeley. They both have masters degrees. Sticking around home was never much on their minds. Both traveled internationally on their own before graduating high school, and have been around the world, unsupervised and unchaperoned, for their undergraduate and graduate studies. And grad school was on awards, costing me hardly a dime.

Since high school, the only time they've stayed at home was either between school sessions or jobs out of state. It was always clear however, that after high school, they could live at home whenever it coincided with going to college. Otherwise they'd have to pay room and board. I doubt that motivator was needed. They see a world too full of opportunity to just hang around home forever. They've always been self motivated to exceed my expectations, so I've never experienced the issues that I hear about from other parents. I never pressured them to excel. My goal was always that they would know how to be independent and take care of themselves. It seems to have worked. My only complaint is that since high school I practically have to make an appointment to see them as they lead busy and active lives and haven't lived nearby since beginning their college freshman year.

The upshot? I don't know, but the only thing my kids probably know about entitlement is what they saw of some of their college classmates who were provided a Visa card by mom and dad and thought nothing of taking off for Tahoe for a weekend of skiing while my kids did work study or another job. So they understand and seem to accept delayed gratification and know that just about anything is within reach if they just work their butts off a bit.

Sg

Just some random thoughts.

I guess I am Gen X, maybe. I really don't know, I'm 29, and I thought I would be waaay richer by now when I graduated High School.

Did anyone see that article in the Daily Oh the other day, about the state workers asking for an across the board raise? Is that a sense of entitlement? "My rent went up, I deserve a raise."

It sounds like you have really impressive kids Sg, great job. I have 3 daughters, 5, 2 and 5 months. I also agree with you about working during school, I don't have a problem with working summers, but if they don't need to work, I don't want them to. I think about when I was in HS and college, I could have caught a lot more fish if I could have worked a lot less.

Generation Y


Generation X

i don't think it's right to blame my generation for entitlement issues -- if anything, it's the parents' fault. i happened to have great parents that taught me what it means to work hard and make a living. i do see a lack of that in many of my friends, who have parents that will bend over backwards to make sure they never got any bumps and bruises. and if you think us guys in our 20s are bad, wait until you see the up and coming crop of sissies that are 11,12, 13 years old now!

i can definitely relate to the living with parents into the 20's thing, though, and anyone who can't is out of touch with how expensive it is to be out on your own these days. to put things in perspective, i think your average 23 year old is going to be lucky to find a job paying 30k a year(most of my friends make far less), and after paying rent, utilities and my fuel bills, i'm lucky to make ends meet. i'm beginning to have doubts that i'll ever own a house, when i'm seeing "starter homes" advertised for $220,000 in olympia. money does not go as far as it did 5, 10, 20 years ago. we moved to lacey in 1986 - my folks bought a house on an acre for under $40,000(making roughly that in a year at my dad's job), which now is worth close to 200k.

This is all the same sh!t that's been said for 186 generations about the generations following them.

Remember how your granddad walked to school......18 miles, and uphill in both directions?

The end of the civilized world due to a generation that can't carry the ball has been predicted since the beginning of civilization itself.

Somehow, I think the world will find a way to get by.

Dan S. has it right on. After 32 years in the same profession, the last 27 at the same place I can tell you that each generation has equal amounts of lazy SOBs and hard workers, with a bunch in between. The feeling of entitlement isn't just limited to one generation over the other. The baby boomers have no room to speak here. Wait until a number of those from my generation retire, who didn't save for it, and you will see what it means to be entitled.

O.K, thats what I was wondering. Is it the same as it ever was, or are the current crop of 16-23 year olds extra lazy.

I guess maybe if I had a cell phone back in the day my mom would have paid the bill for me.. and bought me a new car.. and paid the insurance.. and I'm sure it would have pissed my dad off.

That's the biggie right there. How is a kid to be expected to maintain a level of acceptable behavior when their parents are not consist with their expectations? And, how is a person to be expected to perform as an adult when they wern't shown or required to perform basic expectations as a kid? They can't because they were not given the intelectual tools to do so.

so here's your conundrum:

My wife is 35, hard working, self starter, responsible for her own stuff.

Her sister is 32, lazy, will not get a job, and sponges off any family and friends that will let her get away with it.

Both were raised in the same home with a Southern Baptist Minister father and a full time mom.

Same upbringing with good values and work ethic instilled, yet night and day when it comes to carrying their own weight.

If you want to really know about generations of people, read "The Fourth Turning" by Strauss and Howe. It's a great read and explains how what seems new is just the old come back around for another turn.

Most likely, you will be shocked by some of the predictions they made based on historical insight. One of their predictions was that terrorists would fly a plane into a significant building like the world trade center. They made that prediction in 1996 or 1997, but now we're getting away from their look at western society.

Tim and I were talking about this stuff last night! I work with low income families in our community. I have taught parenting classes 1 to 2 times a week on top of my daytime job. I have now got a promotion and will be doing social work with our families in the community. It frustrates the hell out of me to see no discipline and or rules going on in alot of families! Children NEED discipline and or rules and or boundaries. Children NEED to have a PARENT, not a friend! Parent's need to stop trying to be their children's friend and be a parent. Little girls NEED to have or know they have their father’s acceptance and or approval...when they don’t...they grow up and marry the wrong kind of guys most of the time! Little boys NEED to have a mother who is nurturing and caring! When they don’t, they end up with the wrong kind of women when they get older! This is all my opinion both personally and professionally:)

I have 2 boys whom I love to the end of the earth. I nurture them when they are sick and nurture them just because...I set rules and or boundaries for my boys because I made a promise to myself that it would be a cold day in hell before I would set the path for my boys to become juvenile delinquents!

I have a little story.

My brother and I were raised in the same house, by the same parents, using the same techniques. My old man would not have you sitting around......ever. Standing with your hands in your pockets would get you rapped on the skull. There was always concrete to pour, sheetrock to hang, tape, mud and sand, a deck to build, a shed to re-roof.........he never ran out of projects.

We weren't given much academic guidance, you were just exepcted to get A's.......B's were frowned upon, and a C would get your ass grounded.

My brother was the classic overachiever like my old man. Straight A's through high school, full ride scholarship at UW, AT&T Bell Labs scholarship to MIT, worked on two different teams whose leaders were awarded the Nobel Prize in physics, holds patents for laser traps, etc. I, on the other hand, wasn't.

I picked a different path for myself. Being out in the woods, or on the river is far more important to me than pouring that retaining wall. I'll grab the rod/reel when I probably should grab the weedeater. And I've been known to completely waste a day because I f'n feel like it.

My brother was killed in a motorcycle accident a couple weeks ago. I'd bet my life that he'd give up all the hard work and accomplishments that came from it for another day with his daughters.

So don't get caught up in thinking the scholarships, the houses, the cars, the boats, the motorcycles or anything else you can possess is all that important. Your happiness and the happiness of those around you is a far greater measure of who you are than what you own. And here's another thing.......you're not going to die wishing you'd have spent more time at the office, or with your nose in a calculus book. One needs to find a balance.

Find your balance, and let everyone else worry about theirs. Ted Bundy graduated from UW Law School and Sam Walton didn't have a college degree. So go figure.

Well said, Dan. Education *is* important to compete in today's society, but so is involving kids in the outdoor activities and spending quality time with them. Too many parents don't. Girls, especially, tend to get left out of the loop.

Sorry about your loss Dan. Since none of us are getting out of here alive, focusing on priorities matters. Good summary.

Sg

Sorry about your brother Dan.