An exceptionally neat new working paper points out that parents’ time spent with kids has increased hugely since the early 1990′s, particularly among highly educated parents.
This is a remarkable fact, and surprising; these are the same parents whose value of time (their wage rate) has increased relative to that of all parents, as, unsurprisingly, have their hours working for pay (since we know that labor supply responds to wage rates). They thus have less non-work time available and are spending even more of it with their kids. Why the surprising result?
The authors go through and demolish a large number of explanations and offer their own: that the demand for places at top-notch colleges has increased (as the number of high-school grads has grown), while the supply of places at the Harvards, Amhersts, and yes, even the UT-Austins has changed little. This increased relative demand has provided growing incentives for kids to distinguish themselves — and for their parents to spend time helping them do so. One nice test of the theory makes the same comparison — highly educated versus less-educated over time — for Canada, where there appears to be less gradation in perceived quality across universities than here. In the North, unlike here, there has been no divergence in time spent with kids by parents with differing educational attainment.
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Very interesting. But I like the first comment from “oz” that many people work frequently from home. I personally do that a lot. As the paper explained I have planned to train my kid the same (I hope I do as planned) way. For example making him improve vocabulary right when he is 6 or 7 so by the time he gives SAT, he wouldn’t run into problems like I did when I gave my GRE.
I’d like to see (somewhat humorously, but not entirely) how this correlates with data on the sex lives of married (and unmarried) parents and, to Andrea’s (#3) point, divorce rates among couples with children. It would also be interesting to measure if kids are, in general, any better off for all this parental attention – personally I think that boundaries and independence, even (and especially) for children, are more important than many modern parents recognize.
I think the researchers’ conclusions about parental motives are a bit unfair.
My husband (49-year-old university pofessor) and I (47-year-old writer/editor at a research institution) have 4 kids – 16, 13, 8 & 4 and both work full time (with some flexibility)
We spend LOTS of time with our kids. Why? One, we derive enormous pleasure from them and also because neither of us ever saw much of our own parents. Both of our sets of parents were very much the 1950s-60s suburban dream type – who supervised and interacted with their children very little. They lived in fully adult worlds. Both of my parents spent far more time with their own parents (based on their own descriptions of their childhood) than they spent with us. My father was always with his father — playing sports and spending time together. We never saw our father. He commuted to Manhattan by train every day and was gone from 7 in the morning until 8 at night. We never had dinner with him, he never came to a single event of ours. I am not being critical – I adored my father – and my mom was terrific. But I have to say I do regret that I didn’t know them better.
Perhaps many of today’s parents spend more time with their children because they feel the loss of a stronger connection to their own parents. I am with adults all day long — hanging out with my kids in the evenings and weekends (board games, bike rides, swimming, reading aloud). I am out of the house 40+ hours a week –how much adult time do I need?
My kid is only five but I do more stuff with him because it’s a cheap way to socialize. Golf, softball leagues, etc are so structured and expensive.
It’s easy to ride with him to the park and hang out with the other parents while our kids play together.
Parents are working more and spending more time with their kids: Sounds like a no brainer: it’s a guilt-driven correlation.. The more I spend in the office, the more guilty I feel and the more I will try to compensate by “spending time with the kids” instead of on me..The explanation of competitive admissions to college sounds fway way ar fetched to me.
Well, my children are small (4 and 5) so it seems natural that I would spend time with them. Also, they are boys, so that comes naturally, too. However, when I look back, my father spend ALMOST NO time with me. So if these increases are from 0% of time spent to 10 or 15% of time spent, then that’s OK. Another reason: I want to make sure I help my boys become strong and happy people and most of the times first hand explanation and direct example are the best way to go. Also: I know I am preparing for the onslaught of attention seeking distractions thay will face in a little while: if I don’t build strong relationship with them now – they’re gone! Finally, I must have heard this a million times in the last 20 years: Children want your time – not your money!
@Mattk: Your suggestion does not even attempt to explain why the amount of time spend with kids has *changed* in the last 15-20 years
Spending time with my kids has always been a top priority (although I haven’t been a parent for very long), despite the increasing wages I get from work. I try to expose my son to the diverse things that adults do: chores, play, repairing the house, spending time with other adults. We get plenty of one-on-one time, but he gets at least as much value from watching me do my thing as he does doing things with me.