most revealing difference between them and their more traditional peers is that new-breed parents are less willing to make sacrifices for their children. Better educated and more affluent on the average, the new-breed adults place a higher priority on self-fulfillment."0 That survey suggests the type of problem we face: Throughout American society today, certain tensions exist between cultural themes and social structural realities. While the demographic trends of the next few decades will test the strength and adaptability of the bonds between the generations and create a heavier burden on the adult generation to support the elderly, the cultural trend has been in the opposite direction, toward a de-emphasis on obligations between the generations. The 1981 White House Conference on Aging provides a particularly timely occasion for re-examining national policy toward the elderly. One legitimate function of White House conferences, which serve as symbolic events with the potential to affect public attitudes as well as to reshape the public agenda, is to construct a list of the unmet needs of specific groups-and this conference can be expected to do that for the elderly. In addition, we would urge that conference to do something more, to take a broader perspective on the ways in which bonds between the generations are created and sustained and to examine the ways in which those bonds might be strengthened. For in modern societies, no less than traditional ones, bonds of affection, compassion, and responsibility between the generations are among the deepest sources of a sense of well-being. 1. American Families 1980, Report submitted to the White House Con- 2. Yankelovich, Skelly & White, The General Mills American Family 4. U.S. Department of Commerce, Bureau of the Census, "Estimates 5. U.S. Department of Commerce, Bureau of the Census, "Household and Family Characteristics: March 1978," Current Population Reports, Series P-20, No. 340, July 1979; U.S. Department of Commerce, Bureau of the Census, “Household and Families by Type: March 1979," Current Population Reports, Series P-20, No. 345, October 1979; U.S. Department of Commerce, Bureau of the Census, "Marital Status and Living Arrangements: March 1979," Current Population Reports, Series P-20, No. 349, February 1980. 6. Ibid. 7. U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, Marital and Family Characteristics of Workers, 1970-1978, (Washington, D.C.: GPO, 1978). 8. U.S. Department of Labor, Bureau of Labor Statistics, U.S. Working Women-A Databook (Washington, D.C.: GPO, 1978). Updated 1980. 9. Ibid. 10. Brody, Elaine, "Women's Changing Roles, and Care of the Aging Family," Aging: Agenda for the Eighties (Washington, D.C.: National Journal, 1979), p. 14. 11. Ibid., pp. 14-16. 12. Children's Defense Fund, America's Children and Their Families: Basic Facts (Washington, D.C.: Children's Defense Fund, 1979), p. 7. 13. Children's Defense Fund, Annual Report 1979 (Washington, D.C.: Children's Defense Fund, 1979), pp. 14-15. 14. Children's Defense Fund, America's Children and Their Families: Basic Facts (Washington, D.C.: Children's Defense Fund, 1979), p. 6. 15. Ibid., p. 11. 16. Ibid., p. 10. 17. Congressional Record-Senate, Senator Alan Cranston (D.-Calif.) (August 24, 1978), p. S14381. 18. Bowlby, John, Child Care and the Growth of Love (Baltimore, Md.: Penguin, 1953), p. 13. See also Spock, Benjamin, Baby and Child Care (New York: Duell, Sloan, and Pearce, 1945). 19. See, e.g., Casler, Lawrence, "Maternal Deprivation: A Critical Review of the Literature," Social Research and Child Development, Vol. 26 (1961), pp. 1-64; Kagan, Jerome, Richard B. Kearsley, and Philip R. Zelazo, Infancy, Its Place in Human Development (Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1978). 20. U.S. Department of the Treasury, Internal Revenue Service, Statistics of Income-1978, Individual Income Tax Returns (Preliminary Report) (Washington, D.C.: GPO, 1980), table 9. 21. Family Circle Magazine Child Care Study, Published February 20, 1979. 22. Congressional Budget Office, "Childcare and Preschool: Options for Federal Support" (September 1978). References 95 23. U.S. Department of Health, Education, and Welfare, Center for Disease Control, U.S. Immunization Survey: 1978 (Atlanta: Center for Disease Control, 1979). 24. U.S. Congress, House of Representatives, Committee on Interstate and Foreign Commerce, H. Rept. #96-568, "Child Health Assurance Act of 1979" (October 1979). 25. U.S. President's Commission on Mental Health, Report of the President's Commission on Mental Health, 1978 (Washington, D.C.: GPO, 1978), pp. 76-77. 26. U.S. Department of Commerce, Bureau of the Census, "Fertility of American Women: June 1978," Current Population Reports, Series P-20, No. 341, October 1979. 27. SRI International, An Analysis of Government Expenditures Consequent on Teenage Childbirth, prepared for Population Resource Center (Menlo Park, Calif.: SRI International, 1979). 28. Report of the White House Conference on Families, Listening to America's Families: Action for the 80s (Washington, D.C.: White House Conference on Families, 1980). 29. Survey by Louis Harris and Associates, 1979. 30. "Industry and Day Care II," (Schatz, E. and T. Flaum, eds.) (Chicago: Urban Research Corp., 1973); "Potential Cost and Economic Benefits of Industrial Day Care," prepared by the Inner City Fund for the U.S. Department of Labor (May 1971). 31. U.S. Department of Commerce, Bureau of the Census, Social Indicators III (Washington, D.C.: GPO, 1980), Ch. 1. 32. Ibid., Chs. 1 and 7. 33. President's Commission on Pension Policy, Preliminary Findings of a Nationwide Survey on Retirement Income Issues (Washington, D.C.: GPO, May 1980). 34. Financing Social Security: Issues for the Short and Long Term (Washington, D.C.: Congressional Budget Office, 1973). Updated 1980; statistics from the Bureau of Economic Analysis, the Bureau of the Census, the Internal Revenue Service, and the Social Security Administration. 35. Ibid. 36. Gustaitis, Rasa, "Old vs. Young in Florida: Preview of an Aging America," Saturday Review (February 16, 1980), pp. 10-14. 37. Masnick, George and Mary Jo Bane, "The Nation's Families: 19601990," unpublished draft, The Joint Center for Urban Studies of MIT and Harvard University, Cambridge, Massachusetts, 1980. 38. Wynne, Edward A. "Education and Social Security: The Issue of Intergenerational Bonding," Character (May 1980). 39. Yankelovich, Skelly & White, Supra n. 2. 40. Ibid. Chapter 6 Self-Interest AND THE Public Interest No community or nation can survive without some willingness on the part of subgroups to see their self-interest and their future as indissolubly linked to that of the larger group. Today, we have reached and passed the danger point of divisiveness. Faction is king. And the divisiveness feeds on itself. People who find themselves surrounded by factional strife end up behaving in such a way that one judges them to be more selfish than they really are. -John Gardner ost discussions of quality of life, including Lual well-being, not collective welfare. In doing so, they reflect a characteristically American trait. This society has long placed a unique emphasis on individualism-the belief that the needs of individuals are the main elements to be served by the social order-and a distinctive defense of personal freedom. Never, deTocqueville observed some 150 years ago, has there been a nation so committed to individual wants as opposed to collective needs. That emphasis has often led Americans to disregard a point that is fundamental to any discussion of quality of life: the good life is possible only in a well-ordered community where citizenship implies a recognition of mutual interests, a shared concern for community welfare, and a willingness to contribute to the well-being of that community. Accordingly, any discussion of the quality of American life has to include an assessment of the social fabric-the bonds that exist between people, the ways in which individuals combine their efforts to achieve collective goals-as well as an inventory of the factors, such as housing or health care, that contribute to a sense of individual wellbeing. No matter how well such individual needs might be provided for, we would not feel satisfied in a society where there was no respect for individual rights; nor would we have a sense of well-being in a society that provided no 97 congenial group affiliations, or one that failed to provide for its own security and orderly development. Unfortunately, it is more difficult to make an adequate assessment of such concerns than it is to assess the level of a nation's health, its income, or its crime rates. But because this is an area of considerable concern today, it is essential to try to do so. We need to ask how much of a sense of community exists, how strong the bonds are to the groups of which we are a part, including families, neighborhoods, corporations, and the nation as a whole. People need a sense of belonging, a feeling of community. If such associations are lacking, they will feel alienated, with little sense of responsibility for the shared life of the society. In recent years, there has been growing concern about the relationship between individuals and the large organizations that are such a prominent feature of modern society. There is a pervasive sense that the large bureaucracies, both private and public, in which so much power is vested have become increasingly remote and unresponsive to individual needs, thus inviting hostility as well as apathy. Here we encounter what many Americans consider to be one of the most troublesome aspects of contemporary life: the relationship between individuals and the organizations designed to carry out our collective tasks. Much of the social commentary in recent years has revolved around this concern for finding a proper balance between selfinterest and the public interest. Attention has been devoted to the rise of "the special interest state," in which the war of the parts against the whole has become a central problem. One of the most influential pieces of cultural commentary in recent years-historian Christopher Lasch's book, The Culture of Narcissism-describes a nation in which "the logic of individualism has been carried to the extreme" and the pursuit of happiness has led "to the dead end of a narcissistic preoccupation with the self.""" There does, in fact, appear to be some erosion of the social ties that knit people together. As the 1980s begin, the nation's mood is a combination of pessimism and passivity. Many despair over prospects for the future. Recent polls indicate that 7 out of 10 Americans are dissatisfied with the direction this nation is taking, and that almost that many think the country is in "deep and serious trouble." But when asked how much confidence they have in government-our chief means of taking collective action-almost half of the American public express either "not very much" confidence or none at all.' The problem is compounded by widespread feelings of alienation, the sense-particularly among the young-that nothing they can do would make a difference. |