Time: Listen Up, Young Voters! Living At Home With Your Parents Into Your 30s Is Freakin' Awesome!!!!

You're welcome. And vote Obama.

First we had "Funemployment," which the media informed us was the exhilarating liberation from regular wages, and the freedom to explore all those hobbies you never had the time to when you had a job, so long as those hobbies are free.

And now -- adults forced by the Obama Depression to live with their parents until their thirty are, well, Lucky Duckies indeed!

The Great Recession has brought with it a reevaluation of the American Dream, and even whether a college degree is worth the money. Now, the idea of living at home with your parents isn’t associated with failure or a lack of achievement. More likely, young adults living with their parents are thought of as victims of unfortunate circumstances, with plenty of good company.

They may also be considered to be pretty smart customers: At the very least, they weren’t foolish enough to buy a home that they couldn’t afford—and that promptly declined in value by 50%. That’s what so many adults, young and old alike, did five or so years back. To homeowners who are deeply underwater or facing foreclosure, living debt-free in your parents’ home must sound like a nice possibility.

Other recently published columns—penned by older writers, it must be noted—have suggested that young Americans who stay at home lack a sense of independence, adventure, and ambition. The New Yorker‘s James Surowiecki speculated that “all the young adult Americans who have spent the past few years living with their parents” represent enormous “pent-up demand,” and that as soon as this group manages to leave the nest, they’ll help lead an economic boom through their spending related to all of the new households they form.

The only problem with this theory, besides the still-stagnant jobs market, is that many young adults don’t seem to be in much of a hurry to leave their parents’ warm, comfortable nests.

Wait, let me see if I have this right. A columnist opined that adults still living with their parents lack independence and ambition, and your rebuttal is that they don't "seem to be in much of a hurry to leave their parents' warm, comfortable nests"?

Were you absent the day they taught the meaning of "independence" and "ambition" in school?

I don't blame young people for the Obama catastrophe -- well, sort of I do, as they voted for him. But they didn't vote for this.

But this writer seems determined to cast their lot as just wonderful, so I have to call him on this absurd spinning.

Yes, if you are living at your parents', and do not have an ambition to be independent, then you do in fact lack ambition and a sense of independence. It's sort of right there in the predicate, isn't it?

Thank you, @ben84. This is my favorite story of the week.

Flashback: The LA Times, June 2009. Here's their opening hed, subhed, and picture.

For the 'funemployed,' unemployment is welcome

These jobless folks, usually singles in their 20s and 30s, find that life without work agrees with them. Instead of punching the clock, they're hitting the beach.

In case you've forgotten (and I doubt you have), none of that is parody. That is lifted directly from the LA Times. Check if you don't believe me.

Time: Listen Up, Young Voters! Living At Home With Your Parents Into Your 30s Is Freakin' Awesome!!!!&bodytext=You're welcome. And vote Obama. First we had "Funemployment," which the media informed us was the exhilarating liberation from regular wages, and the freedom to explore all those hobbies you never had the time to when you had a job,...&topic=world_news"> posted by Ace at 04:44 PM

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