PenPenWrites

This just in from Great Britain. A survey by Selftrade of 2,000 Brits on fallout from the current economic downturn finds that "50% of British adults have been forced to make a ‘Plan B’
in the last year, as their lives have taken a surprise turn in a
different direction. In 87% of these cases, a life change drove a major
shift in financial outlook and habits."

While the survey identified "the need for people to empower
themselves by taking control of their finances to secure against
financial difficulties should a lifestyle U-turn be necessary," what was of interest to me–and presumably, readers of this blog–is the finding on how parents of adult children were reacting. Here's the excerpt on that point:

"The Forever parents
An emerging social trend in “Recession Britain”
is the growth of the multi-generation home. Parents who experienced the
surprise return of their adult children back home went through a number
of sudden financial shifts. Suddenly devoid of their independence they
were the group least likely to put themselves first (14%) or to be
selfish when planning financial goals (15%). They were also the group
most relaxed about taking on more debt (12%) and were least bothered
about boosting their savings (10%) or investments (17%) – probably
because they had little left over that they could put away."