There is a flip side to all this. If you don't think you have much control as a parent then you can't protect your kids.
"Instead, it’s peers, random social encounters , and the larger culture."
What if you don't have a lot of confidence in the broader culture? Caplan himself brags about living in a bubble. Bubbles cost money.
For instance, before 2020 I was pretty committed to sending our kids to public school. Not that I thought it was great, but I bought the Caplan line that it wouldn't matter much and it would be cheap and convenient (and I myself went to public school). But what I witnessed happen in our local schools in 2020 completely changed my mind, and I don't think it's a COVID one off. So now we want to send them to private school, and even cheap schools are expensive when you add up tuition for several kids and deal with transporting them.
I think Caplan would even buy this because he took his kids out of the public schools and homeschools them. But homeschooling generally means one parent not working.
Lastly, I think it's easier to take a laissez faire attitude on parenting when you know your offspring are going to be high IQ high conscientiousness people that are likely to self manage with minimal input.
In short, I think Caplan's advice is probably true for people like Bryan Caplan, and was especially true in the era we were growing up (which had a more standardized "larger culture"). But I don't think over-investment is the main thing keeping down fertility rates.
Finally, a lot of this stuff is based around the idea of adult SES as the be all end all of a happy life. I think that a lot of what makes a good life lies outside adult SES. If I could be a bit topical, its entirely possible that in twenty years all these masked protestors on Ivy League campuses will get jobs and become squares like the hippies before them, but it won't change what a miserable time these people made of their college years. And if Caplan put his kids into the same indoctrinating institutions and was hands off then it could easily have been his kids.
Yes, this book is meant for people who are conscientious, educated, middle class Americans. The kind of parents involved in the twin studies. Not unlike Caplan. Because it's easy to measure SES the studies focus on that, but they also measure proxies for non-SES factors like marriage and religion.
We agree about broader society and the state of the schools. If you can, it's likely better to homeschool or move kids to private schools. But, even if you have money and time, it's difficult to protect kids from the internet. That fact, the influence of nature, and kid's natural resiliency renders the public schools a fine option for many.
I also don't think over-investment is one of the main things keeping down fertility rates, but it is a factor.
Thank you for sharing this! Caplan's book has been on my reading list for a while so you've encouraged me to go read it. From my experience the confusion lies in people failing to distinguish between personality and character. Personality is highly heritable and very difficult for parents to change...personalities are not objectively better or worse, just different, so everyone is happier if parents love their kids for themselves and do not try to change their personalities. Character, on the other hand, develops over time and can be malleable, and of course we make value judgments that certain types of character are better or worse. That's where parents and other external influences can make a big difference on life outcomes. So in my experience, wise parents will appreciate and not try to change a child's personality, but focus on offering as much gentle guidance as possible at the level of character and emotional reactions. Just my two cents' worth on this issue!
Thanks for reading. That distinction is important. Caplan would likely argue that the typical parent doesn’t impact their children’s character much, some common sense caveats. The twin and adoption research suggests children share more traits downstream of character with their biological parents (and twin) than their adoptive parents. Caplan’s summary of this is good.
But there is always the issue about whether someone should think they are the typical parent (some people are more persuasive and such than others). Perhaps there are effective strategies for changing people that most parents can use.
There is a flip side to all this. If you don't think you have much control as a parent then you can't protect your kids.
"Instead, it’s peers, random social encounters , and the larger culture."
What if you don't have a lot of confidence in the broader culture? Caplan himself brags about living in a bubble. Bubbles cost money.
For instance, before 2020 I was pretty committed to sending our kids to public school. Not that I thought it was great, but I bought the Caplan line that it wouldn't matter much and it would be cheap and convenient (and I myself went to public school). But what I witnessed happen in our local schools in 2020 completely changed my mind, and I don't think it's a COVID one off. So now we want to send them to private school, and even cheap schools are expensive when you add up tuition for several kids and deal with transporting them.
I think Caplan would even buy this because he took his kids out of the public schools and homeschools them. But homeschooling generally means one parent not working.
Lastly, I think it's easier to take a laissez faire attitude on parenting when you know your offspring are going to be high IQ high conscientiousness people that are likely to self manage with minimal input.
In short, I think Caplan's advice is probably true for people like Bryan Caplan, and was especially true in the era we were growing up (which had a more standardized "larger culture"). But I don't think over-investment is the main thing keeping down fertility rates.
Finally, a lot of this stuff is based around the idea of adult SES as the be all end all of a happy life. I think that a lot of what makes a good life lies outside adult SES. If I could be a bit topical, its entirely possible that in twenty years all these masked protestors on Ivy League campuses will get jobs and become squares like the hippies before them, but it won't change what a miserable time these people made of their college years. And if Caplan put his kids into the same indoctrinating institutions and was hands off then it could easily have been his kids.
Yes, this book is meant for people who are conscientious, educated, middle class Americans. The kind of parents involved in the twin studies. Not unlike Caplan. Because it's easy to measure SES the studies focus on that, but they also measure proxies for non-SES factors like marriage and religion.
We agree about broader society and the state of the schools. If you can, it's likely better to homeschool or move kids to private schools. But, even if you have money and time, it's difficult to protect kids from the internet. That fact, the influence of nature, and kid's natural resiliency renders the public schools a fine option for many.
I also don't think over-investment is one of the main things keeping down fertility rates, but it is a factor.
Thank you for sharing this! Caplan's book has been on my reading list for a while so you've encouraged me to go read it. From my experience the confusion lies in people failing to distinguish between personality and character. Personality is highly heritable and very difficult for parents to change...personalities are not objectively better or worse, just different, so everyone is happier if parents love their kids for themselves and do not try to change their personalities. Character, on the other hand, develops over time and can be malleable, and of course we make value judgments that certain types of character are better or worse. That's where parents and other external influences can make a big difference on life outcomes. So in my experience, wise parents will appreciate and not try to change a child's personality, but focus on offering as much gentle guidance as possible at the level of character and emotional reactions. Just my two cents' worth on this issue!
Thanks for reading. That distinction is important. Caplan would likely argue that the typical parent doesn’t impact their children’s character much, some common sense caveats. The twin and adoption research suggests children share more traits downstream of character with their biological parents (and twin) than their adoptive parents. Caplan’s summary of this is good.
But there is always the issue about whether someone should think they are the typical parent (some people are more persuasive and such than others). Perhaps there are effective strategies for changing people that most parents can use.