The Recession Finally Hits Hipsters

Oh Williamsburg! Oh loft of rich hipsters in their 20s and 30s who rely on Daddy and Mommy's money! It's about damn time someone took you down a peg.

According to this New York Times article, those annoyingly advantaged kids you went to NYU, Amherst, Yale, and UPenn with are having to downsize.

Famed for its concentration of heavily subsidized 20-something residents — also nicknamed trust-funders or trustafarians — Williamsburg is showing signs of trouble. Parents whose money helped fuel one of the city’s most radical gentrifications in recent years have stopped buying their children new luxury condos, subsidizing rents and providing cash to spend at Bedford Avenue’s boutiques and coffee houses. - NYT

These parents are having to worry about their retirement savings and clenching their fists. For their children this means they either have to 1. Get a paying job or 2. Move home. I don't know ONE person in all of my educational pursuits that has graduated and said "Gee...I don't think I'll get a job. My parents will just pay me to LIVE." Clearly I am in a lower caste system.

The culture of the area often mocks residents who depend on their families. Misha Calvert, 26, a writer who relied on her parents during her first year in the city, now has three roommates, works in freelance jobs and organizes parties to help keep her afloat while she writes plays and acts in films. There is a “giant stigma,” she said, for Williamsburg residents who are not financially independent.

“It takes the wind out of you if you’re not the independent, self-reliant artist you claim to be,” she said, “if you’re just daddy’s little girl.”

Really Misha? Ya think so?