Is a Dad Just a Baby-Sitter?

According to the U.S. Census Bureau, dads are just baby-sitters.

When both parents are present in a household, the U.S. Census Bureau automatically assumes that the mother is the "designated parent." And when that "designated parent" is doing something radical, like working, the government wants to know what she is doing with her children.

According to the most recent data, dad takes care of the kids about 32 percent of the time. Yet, the Census bureau doesn't call this parenting, they call this a "child care arrangement."

The assumption is based on stereotypical and outdated gender norms, norms that assume children will have one female parent who mothers them and one male parent who will provide financially for them. The Census Bureau, by framing mothers as the "designated parent," normalizes these sexist assumptions about parental roles. As KJ Dell'Antonia, of the New York Times writes:

If, every morning, I go off to work and my husband stays home with a child, that’s a “child care arrangement” in the eyes of this governmental institution. If the reverse is true, it’s not.

The Census Bureau's classifications implicitly normalize assumptions that women are naturally suited for care giving by referring only to the father's time with his children as "work." If the mom is caring for the children, that is parenting. If the father is doing it, it is a child care arrangement; a job. It implies that women find it easier and more natural to take care of children than men do, or that men are doing women a favor by taking on an extra "job" and watching the children.

Setting up the survey this way makes it difficult to track changes about who is doing what in families at a time when parental roles are rapidly changing. And it should offend parents. Not just women, who are assumed to be the "designated parent" and whose care giving isn't considered work, but also men, whose parenting is considered to be nothing more than baby-sitting.

All Our Kin Blog Post for Ms. Foundation for Women

Check out my guest post on the Ms. Foundation for Women's blog!


P.S. I promise this will be the last All Our Kin-related blog post for a long time.

You're Invited! All Our Kin Event in NYC

On January 19th, All Our Kin is hosting an exciting event in New York City. The event will feature a presentation on the economic impact of child care licensing initiatives on child care providers, low-income parents, and children. Speakers include Dr. Shyama Venkateswar from the National Council for Research on Women and Helen Blank from the National Women's Law Center. If you have some free time that morning, swing by to grab some (free!) breakfast and learn about feminist economic development. Click here for more information and an event flyer.

Closing the Achievement Gap in Connecticut

On Monday, I testified on behalf of the organization I work for, All Our Kin, at Connecticut's Achievement Gap Task Force Meeting. The achievement gap in Connecticut between  low-income and non-low-income students is the largest in the country, so obviously this is a critical issue. Read my testimony here. Or watch the task force meeting in its entirety here.

Thinking About Job Creation? Look Close to Home

Check out my op-ed in the Connecticut Mirror!

In it, I argue that investing in early childhood care and education is a critical economic development model because it impacts women in two ways: it helps women, who provide the majority of caregiving, get the child care they need to work and helps women in the child care industry earn a better salary and maintain a higher-quality of life.

I've been disappointed in how male-oriented Obama's economic recovery plans have been, with their focus on construction and green energy (and let's not forget those auto industry and Wall Street bailouts!) As Linda Hirshman pointed out, these industries are dominated by men; women make up only nine percent of construction workers and twelve percent of engineers (who do a good deal of the work on green energy). Catalyst reports that 22.6 percent of auto industry employees are women and only 18.8 percent of the executives, managers and senior-level officers on Wall Street are women (men also make much more).

I'm a huge fan of programs that support women who want to go into these male-dominated fields, and I would have loved it if the economic recovery plan included incentives for these male-dominated professions to hire more women. But as I understand it, the plan didn't, which means that our economic recovery plan is really a plan to help put money back into the wallets of men.

Part of the issue is that construction is still seen as a golden economic recovery model, due largely to the success of similar plans implemented by Roosevelt and Eisenhower. However, when Roosevelt and Eisenhower instituted their plans, women didn't make up 46 percent of the workforce, like they do today. I fear, however, that another implicit reason behind such a male-oriented recovery plan is the assumption that men are still the head-of-household; the main breadwinner whose salary and ability to work is critical for his family and sense of self. Women's work is often thought of as a luxury, something that women want to do for "extra money," for fun, or because they're selfish (this would be the conservative, get-back-in-the-home argument). The assumption is that women have a man's salary to fall back on.

But this simply isn't true. Many families need two salaries to survive, and many women provide the only financial support for their families and children. Moreover, we shouldn't be sending any message that "women's work" is less important.

By investing in female-dominated fields, such as child care, we help women find jobs and increase their earning potential. Moreover, by investing in child care, we help all women have the support that they need to work, whether as a child care provider, teacher, or Wall Street executive.