One fascinating map:
Source: qz.com
And here is the same data set for 2013:
Source: qz.com
Plotting percentage of people aged 25-34 living with their parents across the continent (plus the U.S.), the map tells a very interesting story. Consider the following issues relating to these numbers. Higher % of prime working age adults living with their parents
- Implies lower mobility of prime working age cohort across jobs and career opportunities (poorer labour market matching);
- Lower exposures to key skills, such as cultural diversity and languages, etc for this cohort;
- Is likely associated, in part, with longer duration in education (good thing) and higher life-time cost of such education compared to labour markets returns on education (bad thing);
- Is reflective of lower employment rates and higher unemployment rates of this cohort across a number of European countries;
- Implies lower propensity toward family formation (a demographic time bomb of sorts);
- Suggests greater dependency costs for older generations of parents who (within ages of over 45) are simultaneously facing pressures to save for their own retirement;
- Implies lower investment and tax bases in the economies where this trend is more pronounced;
- Likely correlates with higher cost (relative to income) of renting quality accommodation - a signal of reduced capacity of these economies to attract high quality human capital from abroad, thus reducing social and economic mobility not only for the country natives, but also across Europe as a whole, and so on…
All of which makes this map extremely significant in terms of identifying future potential for long-term economic development and growth in a number of European countries. And, frankly speaking, for any country with said percentage in excess of 20%, these prospects are not too great…
Welcome to Europe's Generation Jinx...
