NYT The Daily: The Parents Aren't All Right

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Listen to yesterday's episode on NAFTA. I don't think it's a coincidence that after NAFTA is when parenting expectations began skyrocketing.

There aren't enough good jobs for everyone. That's what it's all really about.

I predict the US is headed in the same direction as South Korea.

I totally agree with this. Ross Perot and "giant sucking sound of jobs being pulled out of this country" lives rent free in my head.

Hope you are buying American then. Even with so much of the value chain coming from offshore, it still matters to choose American brands and companies.

Most people don't care anymore. But it matters.

[Anonymous]

I listened to it this morning and while I agree the premise is interesting I didn't find it that useful. They run down how the current intensive style of parenting came about (and contrary to the PP who says this is just about dual income families and fewer SAHPs it's not true -- working moms today spend more time with their kids than SAHms did a generation or two ago). This is interesting but not news -- they talk about the increase in safety concerns around kids and the influence of the media and social media. Also the rise of the "parenting expert" and the idea that you couldn't just parent on instinct and that you need expert help. All interesting but not something I needed the NYT to explain to me.

And then the back end of this is disappointing because they kind of ask "well does intensive parenting at least work even if it drives parents crazy" and the answer is: maybe? The journalist talks about having spoken to some young adults who were raised this way and they all seemed to be happy and have good relationships with their parents. But it's not scientific and there's no controlling for things like SES and culture and education levels that can heavily influence that.

In the end it felt like a pointless exercise that perhaps even vaguely increased my parental stress just by talking so much about parental stress. With no conclusions or really even any new or enlightening info. It was just like "yeah okay -- that tracks" and then no take aways.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:This article is such BS, it’s not about intensive parenting. It’s about having two working parents required to just get by, and then really expensive housing which makes everything else harder to manage and afford. There was a lot easier lifestyle where without intensive parenting, when you had a parent, who was home to take care of everything related to the kids as well as clean and cook.

But what parent really wants to give up everything to stay home cooking and cleaning? I know some people are happy to do it, but it shouldn’t be an expectation for good parenting.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I listened to it this morning and while I agree the premise is interesting I didn't find it that useful. They run down how the current intensive style of parenting came about (and contrary to the PP who says this is just about dual income families and fewer SAHPs it's not true -- working moms today spend more time with their kids than SAHms did a generation or two ago). This is interesting but not news -- they talk about the increase in safety concerns around kids and the influence of the media and social media. Also the rise of the "parenting expert" and the idea that you couldn't just parent on instinct and that you need expert help. All interesting but not something I needed the NYT to explain to me.

And then the back end of this is disappointing because they kind of ask "well does intensive parenting at least work even if it drives parents crazy" and the answer is: maybe? The journalist talks about having spoken to some young adults who were raised this way and they all seemed to be happy and have good relationships with their parents. But it's not scientific and there's no controlling for things like SES and culture and education levels that can heavily influence that.

In the end it felt like a pointless exercise that perhaps even vaguely increased my parental stress just by talking so much about parental stress. With no conclusions or really even any new or enlightening info. It was just like "yeah okay -- that tracks" and then no take aways.

Would the bolded not be especially compounding the issue? I imagine my grandmother had a lot less stress not spending a ton of time with her kids AND not working outside the home that if she was both intensively parenting and also working, plus trying to maintain a household (though let's be honest, most on DCUM outsource a ton of the household maintenance than my grandmother did, including some non-obvious things like the fact that chickens are sold at the grocery store sliced up where back in the day they would have been whole).

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Listen to yesterday's episode on NAFTA. I don't think it's a coincidence that after NAFTA is when parenting expectations began skyrocketing.

There aren't enough good jobs for everyone. That's what it's all really about.

I predict the US is headed in the same direction as South Korea.

I totally agree with this. Ross Perot and "giant sucking sound of jobs being pulled out of this country" lives rent free in my head.

Hope you are buying American then. Even with so much of the value chain coming from offshore, it still matters to choose American brands and companies.

Most people don't care anymore. But it matters.

We try, we do try.

But it's actually super hard.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Interesting episode they dropped today:

Parents report being more stressed than other adults, and the U.S. Surgeon General now considers raising a family a health risk.

For years, research on hyper-attentive parenting has focused on all the ways that it can hurt children.

Now, the U.S. government is reframing that conversation and asking if our new era of parenting is actually bad for the parents themselves.

Claire Cain Miller, who covers families and education for The New York Times, explains why raising children is a risk to your health.

https://www.nytimes.com/2024/10/09/podcasts/the-daily/parenting-stress.html

I mean yes it's hard but "a risk to your health," good grief.

I certainly don’t have time to exercise or get enough sleep because of work and kids.

So maybe it's work that's a risk to your health.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Listen to yesterday's episode on NAFTA. I don't think it's a coincidence that after NAFTA is when parenting expectations began skyrocketing.

There aren't enough good jobs for everyone. That's what it's all really about.

I predict the US is headed in the same direction as South Korea.

I totally agree with this. Ross Perot and "giant sucking sound of jobs being pulled out of this country" lives rent free in my head.

This is the answer. Parents could chill in the past knowing that even if their kids did poorly in school they'd have a chance to get it together, learn a trade and have a middle class life. That expectation is gone. No one on my mom's side of the family went to college and they all still managed to buy new houses, new cars, take a vacation every year and save plenty for retirement.
Now it's a struggle from birth to ensure that your child will be middle class. The only parents who aren't worried are like the Sephora mom raising her daughter to be a sugar baby. The rest of us are stressed.

My siblings both flunked out of college and ended up with good office jobs, not back breaking trade jobs.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:This article is such BS, it’s not about intensive parenting. It’s about having two working parents required to just get by, and then really expensive housing which makes everything else harder to manage and afford. There was a lot easier lifestyle where without intensive parenting, when you had a parent, who was home to take care of everything related to the kids as well as clean and cook.

But this goes along with intensive parenting. A lot of what people claim is a necessary expense and why a second salary is necessary, really isn’t.

No iPhones for kids
Community college for kids or in-state at the most
Kids share bedrooms
No or very few activities for kids
Limited travel. Maybe one week vacation every year
I could go on…


^^do the above and your expenses go down dramatically.

DP. Even if you tried to live a 1950s lifestyle, could you? As a kid I lived in a 1600 square foot house. We knew the prior owner. They lived there with 6 kids. There were 4 bedrooms in that house and 2 were quite small. 2 bathrooms. A 1950s family would have had only one car. Grocery shopping and all other errands were done on foot (so has to be walkable) or after the car came home for the evening. Wardrobes are a lot smaller - both to save money and because you were cramming 8 people into a 1600 sq ft house.

I couldn't do it. Grocery store is not walkable from my house, and it's actually not that far it's just that we lack sidewalks on a secondary road that I'd have to take to get there. I have a similar sized house to the one I grew up in and cannot imagine cramming 3 more people into it (family of 5). Sure we could cut activities but the park my kids would then go play in for their spare time is across yet another busy road.

And even if I pared my lifestyle back like that, I'd have to do as you say and not plan on my kids getting to go to the college of their choice. And I just won't make that compromise.

Grocery delivery was big business in the '50s when there were lots of one car households. The milkman, the butcher, etc. all delivered. It disappeared for a while, but grocery delivery is big again.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:This article is such BS, it’s not about intensive parenting. It’s about having two working parents required to just get by, and then really expensive housing which makes everything else harder to manage and afford. There was a lot easier lifestyle where without intensive parenting, when you had a parent, who was home to take care of everything related to the kids as well as clean and cook.

But this goes along with intensive parenting. A lot of what people claim is a necessary expense and why a second salary is necessary, really isn’t.

No iPhones for kids
Community college for kids or in-state at the most
Kids share bedrooms
No or very few activities for kids
Limited travel. Maybe one week vacation every year
I could go on…


^^do the above and your expenses go down dramatically.

DP. Even if you tried to live a 1950s lifestyle, could you? As a kid I lived in a 1600 square foot house. We knew the prior owner. They lived there with 6 kids. There were 4 bedrooms in that house and 2 were quite small. 2 bathrooms. A 1950s family would have had only one car. Grocery shopping and all other errands were done on foot (so has to be walkable) or after the car came home for the evening. Wardrobes are a lot smaller - both to save money and because you were cramming 8 people into a 1600 sq ft house.

I couldn't do it. Grocery store is not walkable from my house, and it's actually not that far it's just that we lack sidewalks on a secondary road that I'd have to take to get there. I have a similar sized house to the one I grew up in and cannot imagine cramming 3 more people into it (family of 5). Sure we could cut activities but the park my kids would then go play in for their spare time is across yet another busy road.

And even if I pared my lifestyle back like that, I'd have to do as you say and not plan on my kids getting to go to the college of their choice. And I just won't make that compromise.

DP. You are proving the premise. You won't "compromise" your more modern lifestyle.

Part of the point is that even if I would compromise on college, I literally cannot compromise on other things. I can't give up my car and still get everything done, even if I stop working.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Listen to yesterday's episode on NAFTA. I don't think it's a coincidence that after NAFTA is when parenting expectations began skyrocketing.

There aren't enough good jobs for everyone. That's what it's all really about.

I predict the US is headed in the same direction as South Korea.

I totally agree with this. Ross Perot and "giant sucking sound of jobs being pulled out of this country" lives rent free in my head.

This is the answer. Parents could chill in the past knowing that even if their kids did poorly in school they'd have a chance to get it together, learn a trade and have a middle class life. That expectation is gone. No one on my mom's side of the family went to college and they all still managed to buy new houses, new cars, take a vacation every year and save plenty for retirement.
Now it's a struggle from birth to ensure that your child will be middle class. The only parents who aren't worried are like the Sephora mom raising her daughter to be a sugar baby. The rest of us are stressed.

My siblings both flunked out of college and ended up with good office jobs, not back breaking trade jobs.

Unless your uncle owns the company, that isn't happening anymore

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Interesting episode they dropped today:

Parents report being more stressed than other adults, and the U.S. Surgeon General now considers raising a family a health risk.

For years, research on hyper-attentive parenting has focused on all the ways that it can hurt children.

Now, the U.S. government is reframing that conversation and asking if our new era of parenting is actually bad for the parents themselves.

Claire Cain Miller, who covers families and education for The New York Times, explains why raising children is a risk to your health.

https://www.nytimes.com/2024/10/09/podcasts/the-daily/parenting-stress.html

I mean yes it's hard but "a risk to your health," good grief.

I certainly don’t have time to exercise or get enough sleep because of work and kids.

So maybe it's work that's a risk to your health.

This is EXACTLY it but America depends on its work, work, work culture.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:This article is such BS, it’s not about intensive parenting. It’s about having two working parents required to just get by, and then really expensive housing which makes everything else harder to manage and afford. There was a lot easier lifestyle where without intensive parenting, when you had a parent, who was home to take care of everything related to the kids as well as clean and cook.

It's true that everything is crazy expensive now, and things are easier with a SAHM, but activities were also more scaled back 60 years ago. There were no travel sports leagues or 3x week practice schedule for 7 year olds. My dad played baseball with his friends in the neighborhood after school. My dad's one extracurricular was boy scouts. Mom took piano, and that was her one activity apart from summer camp. Kids had more freedom and could roam around the neighborhood, walk to and from school, etc without adult supervision. Just eliminating pick up and drop offs would feel immensely freeing for most of today's parents.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Do you have a gift link??

to a free podcast?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:This article is such BS, it’s not about intensive parenting. It’s about having two working parents required to just get by, and then really expensive housing which makes everything else harder to manage and afford. There was a lot easier lifestyle where without intensive parenting, when you had a parent, who was home to take care of everything related to the kids as well as clean and cook.

But this goes along with intensive parenting. A lot of what people claim is a necessary expense and why a second salary is necessary, really isn’t.

No iPhones for kids
Community college for kids or in-state at the most
Kids share bedrooms
No or very few activities for kids
Limited travel. Maybe one week vacation every year
I could go on…


^^do the above and your expenses go down dramatically.

DP. Even if you tried to live a 1950s lifestyle, could you? As a kid I lived in a 1600 square foot house. We knew the prior owner. They lived there with 6 kids. There were 4 bedrooms in that house and 2 were quite small. 2 bathrooms. A 1950s family would have had only one car. Grocery shopping and all other errands were done on foot (so has to be walkable) or after the car came home for the evening. Wardrobes are a lot smaller - both to save money and because you were cramming 8 people into a 1600 sq ft house.

I couldn't do it. Grocery store is not walkable from my house, and it's actually not that far it's just that we lack sidewalks on a secondary road that I'd have to take to get there. I have a similar sized house to the one I grew up in and cannot imagine cramming 3 more people into it (family of 5). Sure we could cut activities but the park my kids would then go play in for their spare time is across yet another busy road.

And even if I pared my lifestyle back like that, I'd have to do as you say and not plan on my kids getting to go to the college of their choice. And I just won't make that compromise.

Grocery delivery was big business in the '50s when there were lots of one car households. The milkman, the butcher, etc. all delivered. It disappeared for a while, but grocery delivery is big again.

Produce delivery too and street vendors in neighborhoods.

Some very low income areas of Baltimore are still dependent on "arabber" produce delivery because the residents don't own cars and are in food deserts:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Arabber

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:This article is such BS, it’s not about intensive parenting. It’s about having two working parents required to just get by, and then really expensive housing which makes everything else harder to manage and afford. There was a lot easier lifestyle where without intensive parenting, when you had a parent, who was home to take care of everything related to the kids as well as clean and cook.

But this goes along with intensive parenting. A lot of what people claim is a necessary expense and why a second salary is necessary, really isn’t.

No iPhones for kids
Community college for kids or in-state at the most
Kids share bedrooms
No or very few activities for kids
Limited travel. Maybe one week vacation every year
I could go on…


^^do the above and your expenses go down dramatically.

DP. Even if you tried to live a 1950s lifestyle, could you? As a kid I lived in a 1600 square foot house. We knew the prior owner. They lived there with 6 kids. There were 4 bedrooms in that house and 2 were quite small. 2 bathrooms. A 1950s family would have had only one car. Grocery shopping and all other errands were done on foot (so has to be walkable) or after the car came home for the evening. Wardrobes are a lot smaller - both to save money and because you were cramming 8 people into a 1600 sq ft house.

I couldn't do it. Grocery store is not walkable from my house, and it's actually not that far it's just that we lack sidewalks on a secondary road that I'd have to take to get there. I have a similar sized house to the one I grew up in and cannot imagine cramming 3 more people into it (family of 5). Sure we could cut activities but the park my kids would then go play in for their spare time is across yet another busy road.

And even if I pared my lifestyle back like that, I'd have to do as you say and not plan on my kids getting to go to the college of their choice. And I just won't make that compromise.

Grocery delivery was big business in the '50s when there were lots of one car households. The milkman, the butcher, etc. all delivered. It disappeared for a while, but grocery delivery is big again.

Produce delivery too and street vendors in neighborhoods.

Some very low income areas of Baltimore are still dependent on "arabber" produce delivery because the residents don't own cars and are in food deserts:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Arabber

Ballparking it, if an American family gave up a car they'd give up about $12,000 in annual expenses (gas, maintenance, the cost of the car itself, taxes, fees, and so on). For grocery delivery they'd take on about $1500 of annual expenses. Not sure how much else other errands would cost to have delivered. Let's assume it's $10,000 savings. Is that really enough for a parent to stay home on?