《经济学人》双语：为什么英国成年子女与父母住在同一屋檐下？

原文标题：
Family dynamics
Home, still home
Why are more British adults still living with their parents?
家庭动态
家，还是家
为什么越来越多的英国成年人仍然与父母住一起？

It’s not just to get their laundry done
这不仅仅是为了方便洗衣服

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TWENTY-THREE YEARS ago, a man in his 30s greeted the millennium “in despair. I’m a single parent, I live with my mother…I need a Life Plan.”

23年前，一个30多岁的男人在 "绝望中 "迎接千禧年的到来。“我成长在一个单亲家庭，我和我母亲住在一起......我需要一个人生计划”。

Adrian Mole was fictitious: his bestselling comic diaries were a vessel for Sue Townsend’s anger at the inequalities and hypocrisies of late 20th- and early 21st-century Britain.

阿德里安.莫尔是虚构的人物：他的畅销漫画日记是作者苏.汤森对20世纪末21世纪初英国不平等和虚伪现象表达愤怒的载体。

But real Adrians are becoming more common.
但现实中像阿德里安的人变得越来越普遍。

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The Office for National Statistics (ONS) says the census of England and Wales in March 2021 found 4.9m adult children living with their parents, up from 4.2m in the 2011 survey.
国家统计局表示，2021年3月英格兰和威尔士的人口普查发现，有490万成年子女与父母同住，高于 2011 年调查时的420万。

Most people in their early 20s, and more than one in ten of those in their early 30s, have yet to fly the nest (see chart).
大多数20岁出头的人，以及超过十分之一的30岁出头的人，还没有离开家（见图）。

And that does not even count the Adrians: the tally includes only childless, single adults.
而且这还不算阿德里安一族：统计中只包括无子女的单身成年人。

Multi-family households (containing couples or lone parents under a shared roof) made up 1.4% of all households in 2021, up from 1.2% in 2011.
2021年，数代同堂家庭（包括共同居住的夫妇或单亲）占所有家庭的1.4%，高于2011年的1.2%。

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Granted, in some other countries grown-up children are even more reluctant to move out: two-thirds of young Italian adults live at home.

诚然，在其他一些国家，成年子女更不愿意搬出去：2/3的意大利年轻成年人住在家里。

But why are young Britons staying longer than they used to?
但是，为什么英国年轻人比以前呆在家的时间更长呢？

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There are many reasons why adults live with their parents: they are likelier to be unemployed, or to be students or carers, than those with places of their own.

成年人与父母同住有很多原因：与那些有自己住处的年轻人相比，他们更可能是失业者，或者是学生或家庭护理员。

You might suppose that the covid-19 pandemic had caused more youngsters to stay or return home.

你可能会认为，疫情导致更多的年轻人呆在家里或回到家里。

Perhaps, but the ONS says that around 90% of adults living with their parents had done so for at least a year, the same as in 2011.

也许，但英国国家统计局说，大约90%的成年人与父母同住至少一年，与2011年相同。

Nor does ethnicity seem to explain the shift. The share of multi-generational Asian households, the highest among any ethnic group, fell.
种族因素似乎也不能解释这种转变。多代同堂的亚裔家庭的比例（在所有族裔中占比最高）下降了。

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The likeliest explanation is that many young adults cannot afford to buy or rent their own homes.

最可能的解释是，许多年轻人买不起或租不起自己的房子。

In the first 20 years of the century, according to The Economist’s house-price index, British property prices almost doubled.

根据《经济学人》的房价指数，在本世纪的前20年里，英国的房价几乎翻了一番。

According to Halifax, a lender, the average age of first-time buyers is now 32.

根据贷款机构Halifax的数据，现在首次购房者的平均年龄为32岁。

Not surprisingly London, which has the priciest housing, also had the highest proportion of households with grown-up children: 26.8%.

毫不奇怪，伦敦是房价最高的城市，也是成年子女家庭比例最高的城市：26.8%。

In the borough of Brent, in the north-west of the city, the share was almost one in three.
在伦敦西北部的布伦特区，这一比例几乎为33.3%。

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The squeeze on housing costs and living space is tightest in poor households.

住房成本上涨和居住空间缩小对于贫困家庭的影响最严重。

Not only are rents high, says Molly Broome of the Resolution Foundation, a think-tank, but for many years the provision of social housing—for which many young people on low incomes would have been eligible in the past—has failed to keep pace with demand.

英国智囊团"决议基金会"的莫莉.布鲁姆说，不仅租金高，而且多年来，社会住房的供应--过去许多低收入的年轻人有资格获得--现在未能跟上需求。

Local Housing Allowance (a rent subsidy), which was increased at the start of the pandemic in 2020, has been frozen since then.
当地住房津贴（一种租金补贴）在2020年疫情开始时有所增加，但此后一直被冻结。

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Lone parents were likelier than couples to have adult children at home. In London, more than half did.

单亲父母比双亲父母更有可能与成年子女同住，一半以上情况是如此。

Homes with grown-up children are more likely to be classed as overcrowded—meaning, for example, that adults not in a couple, or more than two teenagers of the same sex, share a bedroom.

有成年子女的家庭更有可能“过度拥挤”--例如，这意味着未婚成年人，或两个以上的同性青少年，共用一间卧室。

In London almost one in four families with adult children was overcrowded, against one in 15 in north-east England.
在伦敦，几乎1/4的成年子女家庭“过度拥挤”，而在英格兰东北部，这一比例为1/15。

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Since the census was taken, double-digit inflation, and especially rising rents and mortgage rates, have added to young people’s incentive to stay in the parental home while they save.

自人口普查以来，两位数的通货膨胀，特别是不断上涨的租金和房贷利率，这促使年轻人选择留在父母家中居住，并节省开支。

They may—or may not—find comfort in what became of Adrian Mole. Townsend’s diarist did eventually find a home of his own: a converted pigsty. His parents lived in another, next door.
他们可能会--也可能不会--从阿德里安.莫尔的故事中找到安慰。汤森的日记主人公最终找到了属于自己的家：一个由猪舍改建的房间。他的父母住在隔壁的另一间房里。

（恭喜读完，本篇英语词汇量623左右）
原文出自：2023年5月20日《The Economist》Britain版块

精读笔记来源于：自由英语之路

本文翻译整理: Irene本文编辑校对: Irene
仅供个人英语学习交流使用。

【补充资料】（来自于网络）
《少年阿莫的秘密日记》The Secret Diary of Adrian Mole是一本幽默的日记体小说，以少年阿莫的口吻记录下生活中的点点滴滴，在成长过程中遇到了很多困难和挑战。他向往着成功和爱情，却常常被自己的糟糕运气所困扰。尽管如此，他依然对未来充满希望，努力追求自己的梦想。翻开这本秘密日记，我们认识了阿莫这个天真稚嫩、敏感善良的男孩。他和十三四岁时的我们很相像——热心助人、希望能成为一个知识分子、开始长青春痘并对此很在意、有了喜欢的人……但他也和十三四岁的我们不太一样，他的生活似乎比我们混乱得多，一直麻烦缠身——父亲失业、母亲出轨、在学校受到班上恶霸的勒索……然而无论是那些鸡毛蒜皮的小事，还是那些牵动人心的大事，作者深入探讨了青少年在成长过程中所面临的问题和挑战，并贴近现实地展现了英国社会的各个方面。同时，她也用幽默和讽刺的手法，向读者传达了积极向上的价值观和人生态度。

苏•唐珊（Sue Townsend, 1946—2014），英国著名小说家、剧作家。唐珊早年一直默默无闻，直到她三十多岁时，因发表了据其童年经历写成的《少年阿莫的秘密日记》，受到了读者和媒体的一致好评，才开始声名鹊起。该书被迅速改编成影视作品，成为了英伦的时代话题。此后，唐珊又陆续发表了《少年阿莫的秘密日记Ⅱ》《阿莫抓狂记》《阿莫的卡布其诺年代》等“阿莫”系列作品，随着这些作品被翻译成越来越多的语言，她逐渐成为全球读者热爱的著名作家。

【重点句子】（3个）
There are many reasons why adults live with their parents: they are likelier to be unemployed, or to be students or carers, than those with places of their own.
成年子女与父母同住有很多原因：与那些有自己住处的年轻人相比，他们更可能是失业者，或者是学生或家庭护理员。

The likeliest explanation is that many young adults cannot afford to buy or rent their own homes.
最可能的解释是，许多年轻人买不起或租不起自己的房子。

The squeeze on housing costs and living space is tightest in poor households.
住房成本上涨和居住空间缩小对于贫困家庭的影响最严重。