2/4/2024 0 Comments Elisabeth fritzl now ageOn the other hand, you could give birth to a baby and then raise it in a loving household: this would be good. For example, you could give birth to a baby and then leave it to die on a frozen sidewalk: this would be bad. Yet, if you choose to do this neutral act, you need to take responsibility for what you then do. My parents did me no favors by creating an “I” to care, and simultaneously giving that “I” life (which is the same thing) as some kind of gift. If I had never been born, I would not care. Just because you keep repeating this argument doesn’t mean it will start to make sense, all on its own. Even if average parents don’t make money on their investment, that does not mean that many of them do - with a normal distribution, you’d expect half of them to. Smart parents who invest smartly make money, dumb parents who invest stupidly don’t.īe wary of the fallacy of composition here, that’s what I’m saying. So, the empirical lack of correlation between investment and outcome may not at all indicate that investments are bad, only that they are misdirected. Wasted money? Yes, for some of those kids who didn’t enjoy it but did what Bryan’s kids do, go along because dad says so.īut for some of them, i.e., where the investment matched the kid’s talent rather than the parents’ preferences, it’s hard to believe that the ROI would not be positive. Others spend a lot of money on ballet lessons, music lessons, tennis lessons, soccer camps, baseball camps, riding lessons, whatever, and none of that shows up in superior performance in the arts or sports. Bad investment? Sure, some of those kids are not that kind of intellectual material. Parents send their kids to private schools, at huge expense, and to the most expensive colleges, with little or no discernible effect on lifetime incomes. Bryan makes an investment, maybe it has a positive ROI, maybe not. But he assumes that their dislike of hiking is made up for by the love he shows them by taking them along on joint trips. Not all investments in kids are good investments, but some probably are.įor example, Bryan mentions spending time with his kids hiking, and they hate hiking. That’s an assumption that needs to be tested. But I still insist that our mix of activities includes stuff like hiking that I enjoy more than they do – and I don’t feel the least bit bad about it.īryan’s theorizing, as well as the research on twins he refers to, assumes that parents are smart investors. The Caplan guys spend hours together almost every day. Sometimes I wonder if I give readers the sense that I ignore my kids. If you say #3, I’ve got to ask, “Why have you got to feel guilty about? You gave your child the gift of life!” If you say #2, I’ve just got to ask, “Why?” Kids are great, but don’t parents count for anything? Wouldn’t it be better if all generations switched from “Make massive sacrifices to help your kids,” to “Love your children as yourself”? But surely in a continuous world, it’s still useful to know the cost/benefit ratio? Most “sacrifices” will still be worth it, but something’s always marginal, right? They think it’s so wrong to weigh their welfare against their children’s that they’re choosing between a “big sacrifice” and “massive guilt” – and “big sacrifice” is the lesser evil. They value their kids’ well-being much more than their own, so they’re making a big low-value sacrifice for a small high-value gain.ģ. They like helping their kids, so what appears to be a “big sacrifice” is actually consumption plus a tiny investment in their kids’ future.Ģ. I’m willing to make a big sacrifice to help my kids a small amount.”įrankly, it’s not clear what these parents have in mind. When I tell parents that twin and adoption studies find small effects of nurture, they often respond, “That’s OK.
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