My 19 year old niece got a around $1000 check each month from SS due to her father dying when she was 12.
The current problem is she always knew about that check.
When she turned 18 the gravy train stopped now she has no free money.
The thought of getting a job, making her own way is now out of the question. she’s had a few that lasted maybe a couple of weeks.
Her big thing now is to act dysfunctional, and trying hard to score a crazy check from disability.
I keep telling her that she will live a life of misery but she wants no part of that discussion.
My family situation was just the opposite. My mother lost her father when she was 7, and was raised through the Depression by a single mom who worked as a maid. There were many nights that she and her family had to go to bed hungry when there was no money to buy food.
My mother vowed that her own family would "never go to bed hungry". We grew up poor, but never hungry. She and my dad worked endlessly to achieve that. She graduated from college the same year I graduated from high school. They lived a comfortable life after that. Their legacy of hard work was left to me, and I now enjoy a comfortable retirement. My family has always given to the government, and has never gotten free money back. Free money from the government destroys lives more than it saves them.