<p>I used to work in a school system in a very affluent coastal town with multimillion dollar houses. I noticed that the few middle-class kids in that town, who were well-off by any objective standard, felt poor because they weren’t rich. Their sense of what was “normal” consumption was indeed skewed by what they saw their richer peers getting. They entered adult life feeling aggrieved and resentful. That was one reason why my H and I decided not to stretch on a house to rub elbows with people who had more money than we did. It usually doesn’t end well.</p>
<p>The flip side of the coin is the privileged kid of wealthy parents who takes for granted the luxuries and comforts he receives and has no concept of how to go out and get those things for himself. Most of these kids are not so wealthy that they are going to get trust funds. They are going to be in for a huge shock when they realize how much it costs to survive. They are very ill-equipped by their upbringings to handle life. I would not want that for my kid either.</p>
<p>Your “proof” of that is what? Entitlement is a state of mind, as is gratitude, and isn’t dependent on the actual goods. There are kids in the ghetto who feel “entitled” to iPods and designer sneakers even though their families cannot afford those things, and kids in million-dollar houses who feel entitled to none of those things. Enjoying what one has is not entitlement. You made that leap all by your very self.</p>
<p>But it’s satisfying, isn’t it? When one doesn’t have a lot of money, rather than acknowledge “hey, it must be nice to have more money, you can buy a lot of fun things / experiences,” it’s so much easier to pretend that money corrupts and one didn’t want it anyway. When one is in a position to not be able to afford anything beyond a directional state university, it’s so much easier to pretend that all those fancy-schmancy private schools are full of slacker students and it’s so much more noble to go to directional state. I find that attitude sour grapes, and lacking in intellectual honesty. </p>
<p>Hey, I would have loved to have taken my kids on frequent overseas trips the way other posters have. The difference is, I don’t engage in the sour grapes attitude that therefore those things don’t have value just because I couldn’t afford them or couldn’t work them into my schedule, and I don’t begrudge others doing those things just because I can’t.</p>
<p>You present this as a fact. Although it may be your experience, I don’t believe it is a fact. I grew up with a lot of unnecessary luxuries that I have no desire for at all. I certainly don’t think I’m entitled to them. I just don’t think they are worth the sort of work hours it would take to afford them. Been there and done that and for me it just wasn’t all that :)</p>
<p>I am not alone in this attitude. I know that for a fact.:)</p>
<p>Fascinating, then, annasdad, how both H and I grew up with a lot of luxuries that we don’t have a desire for either – my father was into fancy / expensive cars, electronics, and watches, H’s family was into extremely upscale home decorating, both my mother and MIL have extensive fine jewelry – and yet we don’t have an interest in those things. We do, however, have an interest in funding our children’s college education and hopefully our grandchildren’s. I guess that puts the lie to your supposed feelings of “entitlement.”</p>
<p>When I was growing up my (step)father got a new luxury sedan about every year. So did his peers. It just seemed to be what was done. Like Pizzagirl, that is not something I ever expected for myself or wanted. </p>
<p>I raised 2 kids. One had some entitlement issues and one did not. Same upbringing in an affluent community where we were far from the wealthiest, but were able to provide well for our family. I worked hard at my professional job, as did H, and the kids now realize this. The kid with the entitlement issues actually got over them nicely almost the minute he entered the workforce. Actually, the jobs he had in college were a good start.</p>
<p>I just don’t see the number of spoiled brats that others seem to see, I guess.</p>
<p>My kids want for nothing, including love and attention from both their mother and their father.</p>
<p>I have great admiration for those who rise above challenging financial (or other) circumstances.</p>
<p>But, my kids are compassionate and take time to listen to other people. They are good friends and good people and they know there are other people in the world. They know the guy at the coffee place by name. They say hello to the garbage man, the postal worker. The let older people go ahead of them onto a bus or a trian, and they dont cut in line. They know they have been fortunate. They understand that other people have feelings, too.</p>
<p>They don’t suggest out of budget things with friends. They go where their freinds can afford to go, drive the kinds of cars their friends drive, are grateful for their allowance. I’m not going to create some sort of artificial deprivation situation for them. But, they’ve been aware of having good manners and being tactful and charitable giving and service work expectations since they were old enough to get a good humor bar at the truck.</p>
<p>I’ve been trying to think how to say that what is most important, imho, regardless of income level, is the behaviour we model for our children. If we want our children to be charitable towards others, in spirit as well as with material gifts, we are probably going to have to show them how.</p>
<p>This modelling is the really really really hard thing about parenting in my opinion. I hope to have it figured out for grandparenting :)</p>
<p>That’s all fine, annasdad, but it doesn’t prove that absolutely everyone who has some nice things or a modicum of financial security is entitled and/or ungrateful, or that they or their children are suffering from spiritual poverty. You’ve stated a possibility as a law. That’s the problem I have with your formulation. The corollary is that kids who grow up poor (whether out of need or by parental strategy) are going to be just wonderfully adjusted with great values. That’s malarkey. My mother, who grew up during the Depression in rural Kansas, was deeply scarred by her deprivation, and she had a loving intact family. I just don’t buy your determinism.</p>
<p>I do agree that many young people today are extremely ill prepared to handle adversity, which is too bad for them because they are going to get some.</p>
<p>This is a forum devoted to college/university issues. That’s not an average concern. Only 30% of the adult US population has a college degree. The parents who are on here are not a representative slice of the population, and probably their children aren’t either.</p>
<p>If we were all going to embrace voluntary poverty, none of us should be on here at all. College is a luxury.</p>
<p>Seriously I think the entitlement issue is probably greater with baby boomers than with our children. We are the ones who sort of ruined the country for those coming after us.</p>
<p>“Entitlement issues are increasingly a concern of psychologists and therapists.”</p>
<p>I have not noticed this, but I am not a psychologist. By and large, the biggest complaints I get these days are regarding irritable and agressive behavior of various persuasions and and economic groups. </p>
<p>I can’t tell what the credentials of the authors are. I am at work, so I am in a hurry, but are most or all by the same author?</p>
<p>Here is one of the reviewers on Amazon;</p>
<p>"My name is Jonah Eyre. I am the son of the authors of this excellent book and couldn’t more highly recommend it. I grew up with these techniques being tested on me and I think that they really work. My parents are my best friends and that is what I think parenting is really about. Teach this stuff to your children. "</p>
<p>The authors apparently have 9 kids, “one of each”!</p>
<p>I only have two kids, but one of each as well.One “above average”, one…not so much… Neither of my kids think things are “owed” them, in spite of firmly middle class or better “trappings”, but one likes good “stuff”, while the other is driving herself a little crazy because she wants to take a fancy trip for her senior spring trip ( in the past she built homes for habitat, or took a trip with her choir to womens shelters).</p>
<p>Are you suggesting that your children are somehow better equiped for the world than are mine? </p>
<p>It’s wierd.</p>
<p>I’m trying to figure out what it is you are “actually” saying.</p>
<p>My kids have been putting in 12-14 hour work days since they were 9 or 10 years old. The oldest is already able to make a living at it, but prefers to finish college, and the youngest is a recruited athlete. (we will leverage for a better school rather than a sholarship, in her case, if she decides to go that route). Either way, the kid works darn hard.</p>
<p>Both kids have been approached to be the representatives for their school with visiting adults and other kids. I’m sure they can’t be all that bad. They do hard, physical work, daily.</p>
<p>I put myself through school. (I was born in a commune in the mid-sixties. I have some clarity around what I think about these kinds of things.) the life my kids have is intentional and not accidental, and if I felt they were entitled? I’d get “on it.”</p>
<p>But, thank you for your concern.</p>
<p>I find it is best to keep the clean up job to our own back yard. Most of us have enough leaves to rake that we don’t need to go over to point out to the neighbors that they aren’t raking THEIR leaves correctly.</p>
<p>I’m clicking on the links and a lot of it seems to me to have to do with basic manners. I don’t think teaching manners has anything much to do with level of affluence? Though I guess at a subsistence level there may not be much time for teaching manners.</p>
<p>Actually, you see entitlement right here on CC, all the time:</p>
<p>“I’ve worked hard and have good grades and a 2400 ACT and I’m entitled to go to HYPSM and some no-good URM/legacy/athlete got MY SPOT!!!”</p>
<p>or, alternatively,</p>
<p>“My kid has worked hard and gotten good grades and a 2400 ACT and she’s entitled to go to HYPSM (where I’ve been grooming her for since the crib) and some no-good URM/legacy/athlete got HER SPOT!!!”</p>