Net-Worth Obsession

http://www.ted.com/talks/lang/eng/daniel_kahneman_the_riddle...

It seems that the guy who is 30 and living at home to work towards his dream house will have more remembered happiness (which is more similar to satisfaction) at the expense of being less happy in the moment. Meanwhile, you seem to be the opposite. I'm not making any value judgements -- I think both are fine.

In the Ted Talk he asks an interesting question: where would you go on vacation right now if given a blank check? Now -- if you knew you were not going to remember anything about your vacation, would you go to the same place? If no, then you care more about experiential happiness.

I feel exactly the same way, I moved out really early. That said, I think there is a good way to have multiple generations under the same roof.

I know a guy, an executive, who lives under his parents' roof with his wife, son, and daughter. It's large enough, they eat together a lot of times, the mother and wife split the chores, and his parents love their grandkids. Babysitters are always available. Both the guy and his father are hardcore business types, the father is a college dropout entrepreneur, the son has an MBA. I gather there's some friction sometimes, it seems to work pretty well. That's in Japan, though the same thing happens in a lot of Asia, and to a much lesser extent, the Mediterranean countries still a little bit. Family ties are a lot closer - I remember being in Italy and thinking how cool it was when I saw grandfather/father/son all eating together quite a lot out at a restaurant, having some guy's time.

So, I agree with you, especially the way parenting/freedom in the West works. But I'm personally going to try to keep my home in such a way that the kids feel welcome for a long time - ideally they are independent enough to self-emancipate quite young, but can come back and feel very comfortable at home even as they get into later adulthood. A hard balance to strike and tradeoffs involved, but good if can be gotten down well.