The bashing of working parents
Barnett, Rosalind C. & Rivers, Caryl
The American media have declared war on the working family. A recent cover article in the New York Times Magazine featured an excerpt from Arlie Hochschild's new book The Time Bind that claimed...
...Trend" stories are too often long on anecdote, short on context, and carefully tailored to fit the "bad news" cover line...
...The stories feature tales of woe of stressed-out parents...
...So, please, subscribe now, and while you are at it, subscribe for two years: that is an even bigger help...
...A recent cover article in the New York Times Magazine featured an excerpt from Arlie Hochschild's new book The Time Bind that claimed that Americans want to spend more time at work than at home, because home is so stressful...
...The researchers studied 152 families in depth...
...Company executives wondered why employees weren't using flextime...
...No headlines greeted a study by a team of researchers at Pennsylvania State university who looked at parental monitoring of children...
...The subtext of these stories is easy to discern: working mothers are damaging their kids by working too much and using day care...
...Unfortunately, the whole thrust of the article is toward bashing working parents, not on getting more resources for day care...
...She calls it "a trend in modern life destined to affect us all...
...U.S...
...Then Newsweek chimed in with a cover on "The Myth of Quality Time," the tag line of which read "How we're cheating our children...
...The only finding that the magazine mentions is that in cases where the mother-child relationship is already weak, placing an infant in poor quality day care can do harm...
...Is the American middle-class family teetering on the edge of chaos...
...But if people believe Hochschild when she says people don't want flexible hours, why should companies bother...
...This is another example of media spin: even positive studies are presented so that the tiniest bit of bad news gets all the play...
...Why should they...
...News presents a grim picture of day care, but it distorts the very positive findings of the massive federal study of infant day care—a forty-five million dollar study of fifteen hundred children at ten sites around the country...
...Americans are finding home so stressful, and work such a friendly place, that parents are stretching out their work hours, cheating their kids in the process...
...FALL • 1997 • 15 Labor and Likud supporters argue on the day before the May 1996 election...
...No big mystery there...
...News & World Report bashed working families in a cover piece titled "The Lies Parents Tell about Work, Kids, Money, Day FALL • 1997 • 13 Comments and Opinions Care and Ambition...
...It's a strong predictor of children's achievement...
...And employees at this company do work six hours longer per week than the national average...
...And when companies offer "family friendly" policies with no penalties, both men and women take advantage of them...
...And tell your friends about this major financial/technological innovation at DISSENT...
...Or is it because they are terrified that in a downsizing environment the pink slip hangs above their heads...
...Parental monitoring means the degree to which parents communicate with their children, display interest in their activities, and know about the child's whereabouts, plans, and activities: in short, how "tuned in" they are to their kids...
...Much research shows that working families are doing well...
...However, looking at research on day care, Smith College psychologist Fay Crosby reports that good parenting can overcome the problems of even average day care...
...And people are not eager to spend all their time at work...
...Researchers found no difference in the levels of parental monitoring among the groups...
...Because the U.S...
...And research does not present a picture of parents who want to work more hours—quite the opposite...
...Another study found that parents who both work outside the home were as "tuned in" to their children's lives as were families with one partner at home...
...When the corporate culture of a company screams "work more" in an era of downsizing, employees do...
...Let's spend at least as much energy making things better for working families as we do on making them feel bad...
...The story does not tell its readers that the major finding of the study was very optimistic: for the vast majority of mothers and children, infant day care does no damage to the mother-child bond...
...We're witnessing another crack of the backlash...
...The children involved were nine to twelve years of age...
...Her thesis could mean very bad news for families...
...They grasp them eagerly...
...It's a seductive thesis, but is it true...
...Not at all...
...And when people don't take flextime, is it because they love work...
...Other data are similar...
...Research shows that most working parents see the family as the center of their emotional lives...
...But is this company typical of the places where most of us work...
...We welcome these new readers, but each copy they buy costs us money, and money is hard to come by for a left magazine...
...This study, a well-designed sample of typical middle-class couples—not fast-track, seventy-hour-a-week types—showed them to be satisfied with their lives and close to their children...
...A study at Merck found much the same thing...
...Twenty-six people in one company add up to a national "trend...
...Post Office, in good social democratic fashion, is the cheapest means of distributing magazines, we make money on subscriptions...
...The real truth is that we need nationwide quality day care and widespread "family friendly" policies...
...Now we've made subscribing easier...
...Our federally funded study of full-time-employed, two-earner couples found them to be in good health and reporting warm relationships with their children...
...Hochschild studied a company she calls "Americo" and criticizes employees for not taking flextime when it is offered...
...They've seen too many middle managers who had scant time for their kids and were still tossed out the door...
...But one can find an equal number of tales of happy working parents, if one chooses to look...
...Almost all major poll data show that people want to work fewer hours...
...Parents want more time for their families—all the data agree on that...
...The problem is that too few companies offer such policies, and others send out the clear message that if you want to keep your job you'd better work long hours...
...Work more hours," it states flatly...
...News admits that high quality day care can boost a child's language and cognitive skills...
...The working couples were as tuned in to their children as those with one parent at home...
...Blaming parents for being "selfish" is not the answer...
...Study after study shows no difference on any measure of child development between the children of working mothers and those of at-home mothers...
...But once again, the negative is emphasized— only "excellent" parents who send their kids to very good day care centers need relax...
...Wait a minute...
...The families were fairly evenly divided between those with two parents working full time, those with one full-time and one part-time employee, and those with at-home mothers...
...14 • DISSENT Comments and Opinions What's the truth about the working American family...
...A major federal study of infant day care found that such care poses no problems for the mother-child bond...
...In fact, younger workers especially do not invest all their loyalty in the company...
...What's going on...
...It's more likely that they read the message from the top quite well...
...Did workers put in long hours because home was so stressful...
...You can use your credit card...
...Arlie Hochschild interviewed people at one company, and says that for 20 percent of the 130 people she interviewed this pattern emerged strongly...
...Do most American workers reject flexible hours when they are offered...
...U.S...
...Researchers who specialize in work-family issues were startled both by the volume of the attack and the lack of balance...
...Many more workers than in the past, particularly men, are choosing to carve out time for family...
...The "time bind" thesis is particularly popular in the media...
...In our study, most couples said they would prefer to work fewer hours...
...Our circulation has grown with each issue for the last several years...
...q Put DISSENT on Your Credit Card...
...A study of six thousand employees at Du Pont found that instead of moving up the ladder, 50 percent of women and 45 percent of men either took some version of flexible hours or stayed in jobs that would give them time with their families...
...Teit HornbaldImPAcr VISUALS 16 • DISSENT...
...The grind is just as likely to get laid off in a major downsizing as the slacker at the next desk...
...In the handbook given to every employee, the firm states that "face time" is the basis on which employees will be judged...
...Fathers are much more involved with their children than fathers in the past...
...U.S...
...Of course not...
...Is everything rosy...
...The largest increase has been in bookstore and newsstand sales...
Vol. 44 • September 1997 • No. 4
