Today's Times refers to an interesting study from the Census bureau about childcare arrangements. The Times article was rotten, go straight to the study.
I'm still working through the report, but there are some interesting findings buried in there.
First, it seems that parents are not relying on one kind of care for their children, while they are at work. They utilize a piece-meal approach. They use a little daycare, a little help from relatives, and sometimes the kids are left alone.
Second, the study itself wasn't that great. For example, they asked parents whether or not their kids spent any time in self-care. Self-care means being left alone at home. But they didn't break down the age of the kids well enough. They lumped 5-14 year olds together. Leaving a 14-year old at home for an afternoon isn't a big deal. A five-year at home for an afternoon is another story. I also wonder how honestly parents reported this information.
Third, it's clear that extended family, as well as older brothers and sisters, are providing a lot of free care of children in this country.
Fourth, I wish they was some data here on whether the child had special needs or not. Childcare is MUCH more complicated and more expensive when the child needs specialized help. I have my own horror stories.
Apt. 11d 
Isn’t cobbling things together how most families handle most issues? E.g., with food, some restaurant meals, some meals cooked from scratch, some pre-processed. With work, the main breadwinner probably has a 9 to 5, Monday through Friday job, but the secondary worker may work part-time, be out of the labor force for a time, etc. On housework, our discussion here a while ago revealed a lot of ad hoc adjustment and variation over time in terms of paid housekeepers, division among co-habitants, etc.
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Yes, y81. Families cobble. Arrangements change over time. Even the definitions of basic terms, like full-time employment, are so completely different depending on profession and geographic location.
Selfishly, that is all very frustrating, because it so hard to really quantify what’s going on out there. And without nice, neat quantifiable data, it’s hard to write a snappy Atlantic article.
People, be more quantifiable, please!
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People, be more quantifiable, please!
Is this something people are clamoring for? Because I have a data set with this exact information that’s never been analyzed.
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“People, be more quantifiable, please! ”
I’m interpreting this to mean, not that the analysis/data set be more quantifiable, but that the *people* actually be. It would make a lot of human science a lot easier if people would just stop being so individual and instead behave in according to standard and predictable norms and fit nicely into 10 or so boxes.
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I only carefully read the part on how the pre 1997 data cannot be compared to the post-1997 data. But, I do have a vague impression that people’s work/childcare patterns are more variable now than they used to be. Of course, that might just be a misconception based on lack of attention to the old days.
For example, the recent obituaries of Ruth Prawer Jabhwala & Yvonne Brill showed the very complicated paths lives have always taken, especially the lives of high achievers (maybe especially women women).
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People could go ahead and be individual if they want. They just need to be more consistent. Studying pain is a huge pain.
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Laura said:
“I also wonder how honestly parents reporte I also wonder how honestly parents reported this information.”
No kidding.
“Studying pain is a huge pain.”
You should meet my MIL one of these days. (I know that sounded like an MIL joke, but that’s actually one of her research areas.)
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Yes, it would be nice if humanity could arrange itself into some two or three (no more, please!) little boxes, because I need a snappy headline to an article. No editor will accept a pitch that goes “people are very complicated.”
Scantee, if you have good data on day care arrangements and the data shows something dramatic, then you have the makings of a fine mainstream article.
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