Still Launching?

Parents and pundits have lamented the perceived “failure to launch” among millennial young adults. Best-selling books like Failure to Launch: Why Your Twentysomething Hasn't Grown Up and What to Do About It promise solutions, while others argue that economic barriers are the real culprits. Yet, amidst this debate, we’ve overlooked how parents and adult children negotiate financial relationships and the moral meaning they attach to financial (in)dependence.

My dissertation addresses this gap through 140+ interviews with young U.S. college graduates (in their late 20s and early 30s) and their parents. It explores the conditions under which financial dependence is viewed as appropriate or necessary and examines when financial support is sought, offered, or refused. By identifying the tensions that emerge and how families respond, I uncover their implicit understandings of what it means to be a moral and successful adult—and what it means to raise one.

Read more about my Linked Lives interviewing methodology here.