The longest cohabitation of the Italian family

It was 1988 when the Centre for Studies and Research on the Family of the Catholic University of Milan published 'La famiglia lunga del giovane adulto' (The Long Family of the Young Adult), bringing to attention a phenomenon that had already been of interest to psychologists and sociologists for some time: the expansion of the transition between adolescence and adulthood.

The 'young-adult' phase of life can only partly be explained by job uncertainty, the prolongation of studies and the excessive cost of housing. Talking instead of 'long family' allows us to reinterpret the phenomenon by identifying an extended family time, in which different generations live together. In our country, the transition is slower: people often leave their parents' homes beyond the age of thirty, later than elsewhere. In Northern Europe young people, supported by a more generous welfare system, leave home as minors. Here, the postponement of autonomy also drags marriage and parenthood down with it, with direct effects on the demographic decline.

The prolonged stay in the family produces the generational inequality that marks our welfare, where cohabitation between parents and adult children has become a natural landing place. The former enjoy more solid incomes and protection, while the latter remain dependent on family support for a long time, penalised by public policies that pay little attention to young people. The expression 'bamboccioni', coined in 2007 by Tommaso Padoa-Schioppa, then Minister of the Economy, though unfortunate, captured the cultural knot of a system in which we are held back and allowed to be held back: children who struggle to free themselves and parents who fear to see them live worse than they have lived. Recent research reveals an eloquent 'I'm fine as I am', a sign of how autonomy has come at too high a price, demanding a more modest standard of living, an unstable labour market and prohibitive housing costs.

Behind it is a model of intergenerational solidarity, far from being a disvalue and indeed a typical resource of our country. The strength of family ties has ended up legitimising the withdrawal of public welfare, which relies on families as social shock absorbers.

However, solidarity ends up not promoting the passing of the baton, when it does not support autonomy. Economic constraints and cultural model have turned the family nest into a permanent safe haven, where protection risks translating into immobility. We need policies that support families, not rely on them: housing, work and services capable of accompanying young people into adulthood, without forcing them to choose between security and freedom. In this way, intergenerational solidarity can once again become an engine of the future, not a ballast of the present, reactivating a desire for generativity that today struggles to translate into concrete choices.