A less often talked about outcome of the rent crisis in Ireland is the barriers it creates for young people to leave the family home. New data from Eurostat has laid that issue bare as it finds over two-thirds of young people in Ireland, aged between 25-29 are still living at home with their parents.
This shocking statistic has almost doubled in just a decade going from 36% in 2013 to 68% in 2022. Much of that increase took place between the years 2019 to 2022 which has seen rents skyrocket and inflation for food and household items reach record highs.
For the 25-29-year-old age group, the figures show 61% of women have yet to move out while a massive 75% of men remain in the family home, presumably addicted to mammy’s cooking.
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Ireland’s figures on this are well out of place with other Western European countries. Just 4.4% of Danish young people still live at home while the figure is 5.7% and 6.3% for Finland and Sweden respectively.
The figures also show Ireland has high rates for other age groups. 89% of 20-24-year-olds still live at home with their parents compared to a European average of 74%.
This morning, the education and parenting consultant, Gill Hines, told Newstalk Breakfast that he was "not surprised" by the findings of the study.
She told the show: “For the young people, it stops them from becoming the grownups they should be – they're still dependent on their parents for quite a lot of things.
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It's very difficult for parents and children to live together in a way that is equal, where they see each other as equal adults.
That has a cost psychologically in terms of how young people see themselves in the world and how their confidence is affected by it.”
Speaking about the difference in the statistics between young men and women, Gill Hines said “Parents treat boys differently to girls.”
She added that “It's this feeling that men are useless and helpless, and therefore we have to look after them more.”
Conor Paterson