Reply to NYT The Daily: The Parents Aren't All Right

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[quote=Anonymous]I think the SAHP v working parent debate in this context is interesting because (at least in the DC area) I think there are two kinds of intensive parenting:

1) The kind where you spend a lot of time with your kids and talk to them a lot and have more involvement in their emotional development than previous generations. This kind of intensive parenting is best represented by how people parent babies and toddlers now (baby wearing and more interactive play with toddlers and talking and engaging with kids this age in a way that didn't use to be very common). But with older kids this can look like spending time to teach kids to cook or working with them on their homework or doing hobbies and activities with kids (taking them to concerts and going on hikes with them). I think pretty much everyone engages in this kind of parenting but stay at home parents can do more of it and I think it's hard to find childcare providers who will do this. Not impossible -- some nannies definitely do this. But it's a minority.

2) The kind where you spend a lot of money on your kids in terms of enrichment and safety and convenience. Activities and lessons and tools for at home enrichment. Travel is a big one for a lot of parents now who want to give their kids the gift of broad experience in different places. Immersion and montessori preschool programs. Very intensive music programs. Travel sports of course.

I think part of the stress of modern parenting is when the expectations is that you be able to parent both of these ways. Because they are in opposition with each other -- in order to have enough money to offer your kids #2 it's going to cut into how much time you have to offer #1.

I think a lot of the debates over parenting stem from parents struggling over which one of these is more important. And of course wealthy parents can offer both because if you have family money or one extremely high earner then you can afford for at least one parent to work less or not at all and that facilitates the first kind of intensive parenting. But this is a tiny sliver of families (though one overrepresented on this board). The majority of families will have to either try to strike the perfect balance or give up one in favor of the other (maybe one parent going PT or SAH in order to do the time intensive parenting but having to give up lots of travel and dining out at restaurants and super expensive activities).

The cost of living in the DC area and other major cities makes this pinch feel especially acute. In order to do the second kind of parenting in this area you really need like 400k or more in income -- so few families can offer that on one income and lots of families have two working parents AND one of them has a pretty intense job which is going to make the first kind of parenting hard.

We opted for a baland (I am part-time and DH's job isn't too intense and we also skimp on things like housing and transportation in order to try and afford more experiences and enrichment). It's a very delicate balance. We are thinking about moving somewhere with lower cost of living just to make that balance a little less stressful.[/quote]

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