Are We 'Overinvested' in Our Kids?

KQED's Forum

KQED

News, Politics, News Commentary

4.2 • 726 Ratings

🗓️ 29 January 2026

⏱️ 54 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

There is near consensus on one facet of American life these days: parenting is hard. In surveys, most parents report being exhausted. Parenting is central to our identities and we do what academics describe as “intensive parenting.” We’re giving it all to our children, and broadly expected to do so. And yet… in new book, Overinvested, sociologist Nina Bandejl argues that the data shows that how we’re doing child-rearing in this country has led to worsening outcomes for parents, kids, and society at large. Guests: Nina Bandelj, chancellor's professor in the department of sociology, UC Irvine; author, "Overinvested: The Emotional Economy of Modern Parenting" Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

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0:45.7	From KQED. Welcome to Forum. I'm Alexis Madrigal. Our book this morning, Nina Bondel's overinvested, is going to push some buttons.
0:56.0	In it, the sociologist deconstructs one of the most powerful ideas in American society,
1:02.0	that parents should give their all to their children, emotionally and financially, and that doing so is the most important work that anyone can do. This is a new development, she argues, shaped by the particular societal pressures of the last 50 years.
1:17.6	I'll quote her here, that we invested all in our children, our emotions, our money, and even our souls,
1:22.6	is not a natural response to either species survival or market competition. Invested parenting is a product
1:30.4	of a broader social transformation over the past several decades, one marked by a marriage between
1:36.2	the economization of life and the emotionalization of life. In other words, as she writes elsewhere,
1:43.1	nowadays Americans hold a deep conviction that for one,
1:47.0	we should be devoted to work, and also that the best kind of work is work you love.
1:52.0	If so, parenting is the most sacred of all kinds of work.
1:57.0	So this morning, we're going to examine what most of us see as sacred work and try to
2:01.1	understand how we came to see it that way, whether we want to or not.
2:05.7	Welcome to Forum, Nina.
2:07.8	Thank you so much for having me, Alexis.
	...

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