>>119395360>Is this an American thing?its something Americans got from the Irish, whom hate their families and squabble.
ALSO, its from the early pioneer days when people left the UK and EU where it was hard for a normal person to get land, to come to the US and get land. So it was a sign of status. Sons would travel to the US, get free land, start a farm, then write back home and tell their parents how they were living it up like their own Lord of Duke with their acres of land.
People forget that. There was a time when land was free in the US, and spices that were expensive in europe were dirt cheap in the US. Its one reason the American south started making sweet tea. Sugar was dirt cheap in the American south, but still expensive in europe. So people could literally pretty much drink money on the cheap.