The End of Ownership: Why Aren't Young People Buying More Houses?

The Atlantic ^ | 2/29/12 | Derek Thompson

[Haiku Guy]

Richer couples! Cheaper mortgages! Millions of unwanted houses! Despite all this, young home owners declined for 30 years, even before the Great Recession. Here's how the American Dream shrank.

When older generations wonder what's the matter with Millennials, they often judge their younger cohorts against such financial and social benchmarks as finding a job, getting married, and buying a home. These observations often come wrapped in weak science -- "blame Facebook for their indolence" -- or dripping with judgment -- "blame their parents for making them weak." The science is weak, but the observations are true. Fewer young people are finding jobs. Fewer young people are getting married. Fewer young people are buying homes.

Between 1980 and 2000, the share of late-twenty-somethings owning homes had declined from 43% to 38%. The share of early-thirty-something home owners slipped from 61% to 55% in that time. After the boom and bust were over, both rates kept falling. The rate of young people getting their first mortgage between 2009 and 2011 was chopped in half from just 10 years ago, according to a recent study from the Federal Reserve.

(snip)

It's no wonder that in an environment that punishes the long-term faithful, more young people are planning month to month.

[RipSawyer]

I have said this before on FR but I will say it again. When I was 23 years old and had only been out of the Navy for two years people thought something was wrong with me because I did not already have a wife and at least one child! Some may have thought I might be homosexual because it “just didn’t look right” for a man to be 23 and not have a family! Think about that, most people now would tell a fellow that age that he would be crazy to consider marriage at such a young age under any circumstances. In fact most who are that young are still expecting someone else to support them these days.

[Varsity Flight]

Excellent comments by all, add the most important:

The intention to regulate the actual individual body of every citizen, with Arbeitsziehungslager-Shackle Care.

(Note: That the Politbureau made sure to have exempted themselves)

[Varsity Flight]

Enter Arbeitsziehungslager-Shackle Care, where the “Exempt Ones”, made sure no matter where one moves or how mobile one is, face a mandated fine and/or tribute payment to an Exempt Ones’ Contractor.