We must first distinguish between can't and won't. Those who cannot leave the house, and those who will not leave. I claim that we have an uptick in the latter

We must first distinguish between can't and won't. Those who cannot leave the house, and those who will not leave. I claim that we have an uptick in the latter camp. By his early 20s, and frankly sooner, a healthy human being wants to have his own life. He doesn't want to live on his parents' dime. Healthy parents also don't want their children in the nest anymore either, and it is their duty to, proverbially speaking, kick them out. What "leaving the nest" means in a given culture may vary (the article in question seems to be talking about the US), but in any healthy culture, there exists the same basic psychological emancipation from parental dependence, an emancipation willingly embraced or imposed by necessity. Loving parenting is a process of progressively removing training wheels and clipping tethers. The goal is to lead someone to becoming a man or a woman: in short, an adult. This means truthful and honest feedback instead of deceitful complements or excuses, upping the challenge, and being increasingly and accordingly demanding, so that by the time someone does leave the nest, the significance of the transition is largely in the symbolic act, not a change in responsibility they can't handle. Parents and adult children should be able to relate to one another as adults. If that's not happening, something is wrong. In short, we have a problem with Peter Pan syndrome. An infantile, therapeutic culture of narcissistic self-indulgence makes this very easy. Mental illness is to be expected.