The Parenting Gap
Amitai Etzione
...This sense of economic pressure certainly has a strong element of reality. Many couples in the '90s need two paychecks to buy little more than what a couple in the early '70s could acquire with a single income. There are millions of people in America these days, especially the poor, who are barely surviving, even when both parents do work long and hard outside the home. And surely many single parents must work to support themselves and their children. But at a certain level of income, which is lower than the conventional wisdom would have us believe, parents do begin to have a choice between enhanced earnings and attending to their children.
There is considerable disagreement as to what that level might be. Several social scientists have shown that most of what many people consider "essentials" are actually purchases that their cultures and communities tell them are essential, rather than what is actually required. They point out that people need rather little: shelter, liquids, a certain amount of calories and vitamins a day, and a few other such things that can be bought quite cheaply. Most of what people feel that they "must have" -- from VCRs to $150 Nike sneakers -- is socially conditioned.
A colleague who read an earlier version of these pages suggested that the preceding line of argument sounds as if social scientists wish to cement the barriers between the classes and not allow lower class people to aspire to higher status. Hardly so. They are not arguing that people should lead a life of denial and poverty, but that they have made, and do make, choices all the time, whether or not they are aware of this fact. They choose between a more rapid climb up the social ladder and spending more time with their children. Communitarians would add that in the long run parents will find more satisfaction and will contribute more to their community if they heed their children more and their social status less. But even if they choose to order their priorities the other way around, let it not be said that they did not make a choice. Careerism is not a law of nature.
We return then to the value we as a community put on having and bringing up children. In a society that places more value on Armani suits and winter vacations than on education, parents are under pressure to earn more, whatever their income. They feel that it is important to work overtime and to dedicate themselves to enhancing their incomes and advancing their careers. We must recognize now, after two decades of celebrating greed and in the face of a generation of neglected children, the importance of educating our children...
Excerpted from The Spirit of Community: Rights, Respnsibilities and the Communitarian Agenda .© 1993 by Amitai Etzione. Crown Publishers,Inc.