Kids are overscheduled to the point of collapse
Kids are overscheduled to the point of collapse
- October 19, 2026
- Work by Nina Bandelj, sociology, featured in the Wall Street Journal
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We all hate the schlepping, paying, rushing, waiting and dinners in the car that come with overscheduling our kids. So why do we keep doing it? University of California, Irvine, [sociology] professor Nina Bandelj and then-doctoral student Michelle Spiegel may have figured this out in 2022.
In the 1960s, Becker first floated the idea of “human capital,” the notion of investing in humans today so they’ll be more valuable tomorrow. … As Ms. Bandelj and Ms. Spiegel explain in their paper, “Pricing the Priceless Child 2.0: Children as Human Capital Investment,” Becker’s idea of human capital gradually seeped from the workforce into the world of child-rearing.
Continue reading, courtesy of the Wall Street Journal.
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