I think it's mainly because these days, it's much harder for an 18 year old to make an indipendent living than it was back in the day. Today, most people don't even begin their careers until after college, which is usually around 23 at the earliest. When my Dad was growing up, it was not unusual for 16 year olds to begin working full time to support themselves. By 25, most people were already well on their way to marriage. This is not the case today. Today, people who are 18 are usually still dependent on their parents.

It's not the children's fault, either. It's just a fact of the times. More schooling is required than before, and continuous schooling shelters people from having to make many real world decisions. It's easy to live a "don't care" lifestyle during college, only to be hit with reality hard once you graduate. I've personally experienced this.

There is a major difference in meltalities of someone who's been in school their entire life and someone who's been in the "real world" for a few years.

I'm not sure of your age, nor am I suggesting that it would have any negative impact on your perception here, but we seem to have different perceptions of the youth of today. I am 25 years old and I can only speak on my experiences.

And my experience shows that there's not much of a difference in maturity between an 18 year old senior in High School and a 22 year old Junior in college.

However, there's a huge difference between a 22 year old Junior in college and a 24 year old who's been working for a year.

There are plenty of biological changes from ~18-25 which impact reasoning. http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=1411647...

In the end all society's have a baby-elder process with many stages. We let 15 year old's risk their and others lives driving multi thousand pound vehicles at 70+MPH. We keep prescription medication behind many additional hoops even for well educated 60 year old's.

IMO, the real difference is how much education people need. A 15 year old can dig a ditch just fine, but cancer research takes quite a bit more. In the end society simply values 15 year old's time less.

That's quite the accomplishment, and is by far not the norm. I am 25 and have only been financially independent since 23, and even I am the anomaly amongst my peers.

I don't see what's wrong with my stereotype in this case. Most people under 25 are not financially independent, and it's mainly due to the society we live in, not the children themselves.

When my Dad was growing up, people had full time jobs at 16 years old and were married with kids by 25, where as today, the average person doesn't even graduate college before 23.

I'm not blaming the children for that.

If that's offensive, I'm not entirely sure you have been participating in the real world. You'd be offended by damn near everything.

Some people are forced into an adult mindset earlier than others. I've known 14 and 16 year olds that could be trusted with more responsibility than most 30 year olds. I've also met 60 year olds with a child's mindset. Clearly, age doesn't cause maturity, but it's certainly correlated with it.

An outlier can't be treated like the center of a distribution. Your own experiences don't mean that most 18 year olds aren't still children. It's not like the government is going to start maturity-testing people to decide when to start dispensing a basic income. They're more likely to test a "representative population" and set the age to the point where 2/3 test as "adult", or use one of the traditional age-cutoffs like 18, 21, or 25.

Probably one of the biggest mistakes is not learning more skills and different skills. In this era of online learning, there is really no excuse for not spending a couple hours bere and there to learn something new or different.

I think we should actually lower the drinking age. It's currently 21 here. In fact, being 18 really gains you nothing here other than the ability to join the military and get into trouble with the law.

My main point is that a few years should go by after a child enters into the adult world before they have access to a fund left for them.

There's usually a short "reckless" period immediately after graduating high school and college. However, this usually calms down after the initial shock of having sudden freedom wears off.

I have two friends who inhereted $20,000+ sums of money from relatives when they were in their late teens, and both of them pissed it away in under a year. Looking back, both of them seem to regret it.

(Me and my friends are all around 25 years old).

Let me know when you have this thing in place: I will start a "Spring Break Holiday Park" somewhere in the south where beer is $20 and a Rum&Coke goes for $40. Only people from 25 are allowed in.

Personally I think the opposite is true to some degree. Age does not guarantee that you are a rational and well informed citizen. I've also read numerous articles about how young people are more tolerant (gay marriage is a good example), moving back into dense urban areas (causing less sprawl and a renewed interest in better public transport and urban planning), and willing to at least admit that major challenges like anthropogenic climate change are real. Society can learn from people of all ages, but often the enthusiasm and free time of youth is what is needed to drive real societal change.