Jordana Gilman, a 24-year-old Ivy League graduate, is studying to be a doctor at SUNY Upstate Medical University. She has worked part-time jobs since she was 15, balancing work with heavy course loads to save money.
Yet as an adult living away from home, she gets an occasional check from her parents to cover the cost of groceries, movie tickets and meals out.
“I feel embarrassed that I can't support myself,” Gilman said, noting that she's “immensely grateful” for the help.
Gilman has plenty of company.
According to a recent report by Bank of America, 40 percent of millennials regularly receive financial assistance from their parents. Financial advisers have taken to warning clients that their grown children could destroy their hope for a secure retirement.
For many recent graduates, allowances from mom and dad are a crucial way to get a foothold in their educations and careers. Yet the practice is something of an open secret: Most millennials struggle with the contradiction inherent in being a self-assured professional and a dependent child at the same time.
“There's this negative stereotype we have about young adults: that getting financial help from their parents indicates a character deficiency on their part,” said Jeffrey Arnett, a research professor of psychology at Clark University.
The newest crop of workers graduated with record student debt and historically high unemployment rates, so it's not surprising some would be subsidized. Yet many fear being labeled bums.
“They're generally striving really hard to become financially independent, but they just can't find a job that will pay enough ... or they've lost a job,” Arnett said. “It's not because they're lazy and they're tired of doing their own laundry.”
Understandable though it may be, the arrangement leaves some feeling as guilty as they are thankful.
Malavika Singh, a 24-year-old marketing professional in New York, was relieved when she had saved up enough to stop taking money from her parents. They had helped pay her phone bills and rent, something she had refrained from sharing with some people in her social circle because she felt it was awkward.
Now that she's financially independent, she says, her relationship with her parents “feels purer ... like I'm not trying to get something out of it.”
