This month, Washington Post writer Jonathan Coppage made a statement that surprised no one: “Kids are living with their parents longer.” But Coppage took this idea one step further into territory few are willing to go.“It’s a good thing” that adult kids are living with parents longer, he argues. Kids and parents can pool their resources, and mark life’s milestones together. Not only is it a good thing, he writes: “it’s downright natural.” Why? “Historical data suggests that the wholly independent nuclear-family household may be the aberration — that patterns of close familial support are the more natural arrangement.”In other words, it’s totally normal and historically unremarkable to live with your parents and the notion that it’s abnormal — that you’re a loser if you aren’t out of the house by age 30 and in possession of a furnished property of your own — is actually what’s atypical: before World War II, Coppage explains, multi-generational living was the way things were done.Young people helped out around their parents’ homes, having and raising kids in said homes, often with the babysitting assistance of their much older roommates: i.e. their grandparents, long before grandparents had the means to live in nursing facilities and sit on condo boards in Boca Raton. This history lesson is much needed encouragement for anybody who hasn’t “figured it all out” by the time they’ve grown their first grey hair, but it’s especially relevant to the young citizens of Toronto for whom an independent nuclear-family household is about as obtainable as the key to the city — maybe less so.According to a story from last week in this newspaper, condo research company Urbanation reports that the average rent in Toronto has surpassed $2,000. Forget about buying an affordable home or condo. Good luck r ...
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