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financial independence

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Oli:
This question is a bit odd for me because of the way the scottish educational system works. Basically I have to point out straight away that my university fees are all paid for by the government through the Student Awards Agency for Scotland (SAAS). More or less they pay the fees for any student doing their first degree at a scottish university that is from most EU countries (england don't count, potentially some others). In addition to this they also give out student loans and grants for living costs based on family income as well as some other factors. I only get a loan - I'm not going to say how much. Loans are repayed through a tax once your degree is finished and your income is at least £15,000 a year. Bear that in mind when I say my parents pay for most of my expenses while I'm studying.

My parents pay for my rent, give me a small amount of money to go towards bills and have also paid for my course books. This means that I'm never in a bad way finacially during term time as my student loan is sufficient enough to cover food costs and various other things. I also had a whack of money saved up when I started uni as well as some I recieved as inheritence from my gran.

I really don't have a problem with living off my parents while I'm at uni. I'm entirely grateful and I wouldn't hold it against them if they stopped being quite as generous. I'm entirely aware that I'm very lucky to have them help me out and while I respect people who are finacially independent I don't see getting finacial help as something which should be looked down on. Actually I resent pretty heavily people who do look down on it for a number of reasons.

My parents have worked incredibly hard for as long as I can remember - my mother is a nurse and works in 2 seperate medical centres, as well as doing a lot of marie curie work. If my parents want to use money they've earned to help support me and my brothers while we are studying then I think it is pretty ridiculous to consider me taking money they are offering as "leeching" off them. It's not like me or my brothers ever ask them to give us money while we study.

My parents are both pretty excellent people and while I don't agree with them on a huge number of things and our interests are incredibly different we do get along well. I like to think that they are not giving me money because they see it as their duty as a parent but because they've tried to raise me and my brothers not to be complete knobs and they've succeded, although to what degree isn't really for me to say. I'm pretty sure my parents are happier because me and my brothers are having the times of our lives thanks to them.

It's not like me and my brothers are having all the fun either. As I'm writing this my mother is exploring in India and helping empower women and street children as part of a Girl Guiding initiative (I'm actually not entirely sure of all the details here because she left while I was on a holiday of my own). In the past 3 years my father's been to Africa 3 times (twice on his own with a charity called computers for africa, once as part of a family holiday to Egypt).

Besides; it's not like I'm going to be relying on my parents forever. Once I'm finished uni I will not be getting any more support from them. Until then I'm busy working hard at university.

Oh also please don't get the impression that my parents are rich. My family is very much middle class. There's nothing wrong with having rich parents or anything, but I really don't want to give a false impression.

TL;DR: My parents support me while I study, but won't once I'm finished. I'm okay with it. My parents are awesome.

Lunchbox:
It's really interesting to find out the way you guys live.

When I was doing my trade courses at TAFE after I finished my HSC I lived with my parents, drove a car my parents bought for me, had a credit card to pay for fuel only, and no income.
I'm 23 now and when I was 19 my parents went through a messy divorce, selling the family home. I was working part time and slacking off most time, and didn't pay them anything re board. I chose to move in with my Dad, who rented a little house in the middle of nowhere. He paid for my car and insurance and all the important things, but left my fuel and personal costs to me. He is a shift worker and thus he's never home, so we established a rule that we could each buy whatever food we wanted but if it was in the house without a label, it was fair game. After a little while my boyfriend moved in with us and after another little while my younger brother (who was failing his HSC for the second time) moved in as well. We moved to a larger house and things stayed that way for a while until last year when my brother got a girlfriend and she moved in with us too. In that time I'd become too old to stay on my parents' health insurance, so I got my own. Uh. Where was I?
Okay right. After playing Full House for a bit, I decided to move out by myself. I found myself a little flat in the fancy part of town, a good forty minute drive from the rest of the family, but close to work. The day I accepted the lease for the flat I lost my job, but luckily I got another the next day so everything worked out nicely. Dad and I signed the lease together (as the estate agents demanded it) but I paid for my own bond and fees and stole furniture from everyone I knew.
Currently I am working full-time-ish and in charge of my own rent and car insurance and registration and bills, and my Dad takes care of car payments and my mobile phone. My boyfriend lives with me but he's studying full-time and works one morning a week stacking shelves, so he just helps as much as he can with groceries and gets a weekly hand-out from his mum to pay for his fuel and to help him save to pay his own car insurance and rego.
When I was preparing to go to Canada I called Dad up to ask if I could borrow $500 from him to help pay for my ticket, and he, strangely enough, was really touched and told me he was glad that I was not afraid to ask him for help, and that he would always be happy to help me out.
Basically the moral of the story here is my Dad is great.

jhocking:

--- Quote from: fatty on 22 Jul 2008, 11:34 ---What is your opinion on financial independence?
- Do you think it's okay to be supported by your parents while you study?
- Do you look down on people who 'leech' off their parents?

--- End quote ---
I certainly think it's okay to be financially supported by your parents while you study.  In my own case, my dad paid for my undergraduate tuition completely. I never saw myself as leeching off my dad. Indeed, that term "leeching" connotes certain wasteful behavior and implies a value judgement. It would be leeching to constantly waste their money partying, but it's not leeching to spend their money on tuition so that you can concentrate your time on studying.

In grad school I paid for everything myself; I didn't ask my parents for money to pay tuition, or pay rent, or anything. Even then though it's not like I'd look down on classmates who were getting money from their parents. Well maybe the one guy who constantly slacked off and was routinely purchasing high-end audio equipment (when a grad student describes himself as "a stereo equipment enthusiast," something is wrong,) but again there's a big distinction between getting help from your parents while you work to launch the rest of your life and just generally mooching off them.

That all said, I am a bit concerned about my sister's dependence on my parents. I mean, she's in medical school and paying for the vast majority of it through loans, but she is attached to the point of it causing problems to the small amount my parents are kicking in to help her with daily expenses.  Ultimately it has little to do with the money; the money is a concrete representation of a more emotional dependence. Which of course is where much of the stigma around depending on your parents for support comes from. It's not so much a stigma about needing money as it is a stigma about being emotionally stunted (the perception of that anyway.)


So I guess that's my overall feeling on this issue: it's fine to be financially dependent on your parents while in school, but be cautious of this financial dependence being a proxy for emotional dependence*.



*Incidentally, by "emotional dependence" I don't simply mean turning to your parents for advice when something big happens in your life. That's normal, and that's what families are for. I mean more like you have trouble functioning on a routine basis without your parents taking care of you.

IronOxide:
So, next year, I am going to be moving out to college for my first year, and my financial system is maybe going to be a little crazy. This is actually the first year that any of my siblings are having their college covered with any definite (like court ordered definite) reliability. This will come out to be somewhere around half of my tuition/housing/food/etc. with the rest to be done in loans (a large portion of which are provided at a modest rate by government). This is much less than my siblings are paying, as I am the only one going to a state school instead of a private institution (that generally cost at the very least double what I am paying)

I have no resentment or problem with people and their parents covering any amount of money, unless the parents are covering an unreasonably small amount compared to what they can afford. I know a girl going to Yale, whose parents can afford it, yet I do not believe they are providing any help in that endeavor. Maybe I'm selfish, but I think parents should generally do what they can (taking care not to land themselves in the poor house, of course).

I think people who do not have to cover anything will have some issues going into the later life, but quite frankly, a checkbook is not a very hard thing to manage.

I am living on campus, and I think I would have done that even if I weren't two hours away from home (I know it's not far, but still too far to be a commuter). I actually disagree with Tommy on the matter of living on campus. While it may make financial sense to live at home, I think that living on campus provides an experience that makes university more socially possible and enjoyable. I do not know if I am going to be doing work study or what to make some spending cash on campus (I have a pretty demanding major, if I am to believe what I have been told), but even if I don't, I know I will be okay with food and stuff on campus, which I don't know about at home.

Oli:
Arguably parental contribution towards living costs could help to lower emotional dependence on parents. I mean if you're living on your own you'd hopefully be learning things like how to wash your clothes and how to cook a decent meal even if you're only able to live on your own because of handouts. Being finacially independent isn't entirely the same as being independent after all.

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