Interesting in Germany last names were implemented to assist the government in gathering tax and census data. It just got to be to hard to determine one Frederick or Heidi from another. Many people at that time adopted “descriptive last names” tied to their occupation or some other identifier.

While I think the idea of preserving the “family” name remains a strong motivation in many families today. I think it has begun to erode. In the end, the only one that must be happy with one’s last name is the person.

In this day of the internet, people may choose to change their last names on a regular basis to make it harder for various social network data bases to track who they are. Of course, that would require we have the right to change our social security numbers also.

Perhaps we might have multiple names, many already go by multiple names on the internet. Again an attempt to preserve privacy by creating electronic confusion.

The relatively recent practice of hyphenated names seems poorly thought out as noted by others on this thread as it works the first time, but runs into problems in future generations. Feminism is a good thing, but a few of its “conventions” should be reconsidered including the hyphenated name. Keep your old name, adopt your spouse’s name, give yourself a new one, whatever floats your boat, you should pick a name you like, but don’t feel the need to adopt a hyphenated name any more than the other choices.

That does not mean, I would not prefer to see my “family” name preserved. But it won’t change how I feel about my children including my four daughters regardless of what they decide.