Thanks to the full financial support of my parents, I recently graduated from an expensive private college in the Northeast with no student debt. After graduation I secured a salaried job with benefits at a large publishing house. I found the work thoroughly soul-crushing, so I quit and began working a number of minimum-wage jobs that do not set me up for any sort of “future.” While I enjoy my current lifestyle, I fear I might be violating an obligation to my parents, since my college degree is irrelevant to these jobs. Do I have an ethical duty to find a better job even if I’m unhappy with the work? NAME WITHHELD, BOSTON

Every family is unique, so it’s difficult to place this kind of problem into a clear context. If you directly asked your parents to finance your college experience with the explicit intention of pursuing a specific career, that would be like a contract; if your parents’ willingness to pay your tuition has been dependent on your willingness to pursue the best possible job it afforded, you would have essentially agreed to a familial form of indentured servitude. But in all likelihood, the real situation is not that straightforward. Your parents probably paid for your education because they could afford it (and felt it was their responsibility). You probably accepted their support because it seemed like the obvious thing to do (and because you were broke). Your current predicament wasn’t really considered by either party, despite how common an occurrence it now seems to be.

Your parents have a moral burden here as well: They can’t demand that you take a job that makes you hate yourself simply because they spent money in order to put you in that position. They’re not venture capitalists, and you’re not an investment opportunity. That said, there’s a reason work is called “work” (as opposed to “wall-to-wall awesomeness”). I strongly suspect your soul-crushing publishing job might have seemed significantly less soul-crushing if you were also receiving the soul-crushing bills that accompany soul-crushing student loans.

Still, you are not ethically obligated to live your life in a way you dislike just because someone else willingly subsidized the means by which you achieved that unhappiness. You might feel a personal obligation to do so, out of respect for your parents. But there is no ethical framework that requires you to be miserable as repayment for their investment in your future. Moreover, the purpose of college is not solely to get a high-paying job when you’re finished. If the experience made you a more complete person, it wasn’t a (total) waste of their money.