Those aren't inconsistencies. You're just asking clarifying questions and getting more information about their preferences.
"Man, it's hard making ends meet [in their head: without living with my parents or without working at the local coal mine or working overtime or doing all sorts of things I don't prefer]".
"You know, you could work at the local coal mine [or work overtime or do all sorts of things you can insert here]."
"But I don't want to."
"Heh, gotcha. So you don't care about ends not meeting very much!"
You just don't share their preferences and think you have a bone to pick with them over it. Because you prefer something, you might be assigning zero cost to it where others don't.
This is a pretty good example of the scaling problem with with transferring voluntary personal work to socialized and financialized government work.
Some activities benefit from economies of scale and others do not.
It is more efficient to hire dedicated garbage man for a curbside trash pickup then if everyone took their trash to the dump. However, it would be terribly inefficient to have garbage men following people around picking up their trash. Half of the population would always have to be on shift following the other half, and 100% of the population would have to work as garbage men.
Is there a economic term for this phenomenon of inverse economies of scale?
Once you realize that 90% of the time it's just a way to bond and let off steam, you can get into the complaining and enjoy being with other people.
Then, you can level up to the master-class where you slowly feed ideas to people while agreeing with their complaints.
And before we had children, we asked. Everyone was very enthusiastic about participating and helping until the kids showed up, and then we were on our own. Bamboozled!
Discussing how things "should be" is one thing, and how to support people who have made the irrevocable choices they've made is a different conversation.
If you want to live in as an individual, more power to you, now fuck off and don't expect videos.
That said, I have a bone to pick when people are inconsistent with themselves, using daycare as an example when people have cheaper alternatives, and then have the gall to complain.
“Why is daycare so expensive???”
“You could ask grandma to move in with you”
“Absolutely not, we enjoy our independence”
“Would you pay higher taxes to allow the government to set up a network of publicly funded childcares?”
“No”
“If you refuse all solutions, stop complaining”
Or…
“I will never be able to save for a home at this rate”
“You’re living on your own on a single income and you’re still young. You could move back with your parents, whom you get along well with, for a few years.”
“Absolutely not. I enjoy my independence.”
Unfortunately, you can’t always have your cake and eat it too. You will pay a price, one way or another. With respect to multigenerational living, that price will either be the living costs of assuming the burdens of a household as a single individual, daycare costs, or a measure of independence. If you don’t have family nearby that’s understandable. A lot of people don’t have a choice and their grievances are legitimate, but many do have reasonable alternatives they’re unwilling to take advantage of for flimsy reasons and then complain about the consequences of their actions.
Adults assume the consequences of their choices. When they have such a choice, of course.