Tag: Arktoons

It’s Not Your Imagination

GenX parents spend 64 percent more time with their children than the Boomers spent with them.

On average, mothers and fathers in 1965 spent 12.7 hours per week caring for their children, whereas in 2011, that number had risen to 20.8 hours per week. More telling is the average father who, in 1965 spent 2.5 hours per week with his kids while his offspring son spent nearly three times that amount with his children in 2011…. Given that hours in a day are a strictly limited resource, this shift in parental time away from other activities to raising children represents a massive shift in values and behavior, one that is well reflected in anecdotes and observations about “Boomers.”

Boomers can shuck and jive all they like, but the statistics clearly support the anecdotal observations about the general shortcomings of their generation.

UPDATE: It’s been pointed out that 1965 parents were mostly not Boomers. This is true. So, do you think Boomers spent a) more or b) less time with their kids, given the upward trend from 1965 to 2011? Of course not…

CORRECTION: Boomers spent 13.4 percent less time with their kids than their parents did, and GenX spends 89 percent more time with their kids than their parents did.

DISCUSS ON SG