21ST CENTURY PARENTING: Parents Are Bankrupting Themselves To Look Adequate.

On the East Coast, affluent parents of bright children explain that they absolutely must live in the best possible school district, and send their kid to the most prestigious possible college. In “flyover country,” parents explain that they have to have a nice new car for the kids, because safety. Also a bevy of very expensive activities, from travel sports to marching band, because otherwise their lives will be blighted. Auto accidents are declining, and bright, motivated kids are probably going to do OK no matter where they go to school. Yet parents can convince themselves to spend near-infinite amounts seeking marginal improvements.

The problem is worst on the coasts, where those amounts really do seem to spiral towards infinity (but of course, incomes are higher there too). But it’s everywhere; people are locked in a status arms race that somehow often comes to focus on the happiness or safety of their kids.

I’m not deriding those folks, only pointing out the behavior. Because the only people who can stop the self-bankrupting arms race are the people participating in it. And the only way they can do so is to start deliberately sitting out the competition. Untold generations of human beings have lived to adulthood without the blessings of a brand-new minivan, a travel soccer trophy or a Harvard education. Modern children raised without them will probably also be fine.

Unfortunately, I’m not sure how much good it does to point this out.

Neither am I, but what can you do?