The Nanny State Is Not the Answer to Parents’ Challenges

The chaos of summer is over. Kids have gone back to school. But fall brings a whole new set of challenges. We parents have spent the past few weeks creating complex matrices — schedules for child care, after-school activities, and car pools. But by next week, someone will get sick, or a babysitter will quit, and the house of cards will come tumbling down. Fear not, though: The surgeon general has our back.

A new report from Vivek Murthy classifies parental stress as a public-health problem and proposes a slate of policies to mitigate it. In his words, parenting today often poses “daunting challenges and significant, sometimes relentless, stress.” But Murthy’s medicalization of the problem is unlikely to help, and his nanny-state solutions could make matters worse.

About the Author

Naomi Schaefer Riley

Naomi Schaefer Riley is a senior fellow at the American Enterprise Institute and the author of No Way to Treat a Child.

The chaos of summer is over. Kids have gone back to school. But fall brings a whole new set of challenges. We parents have spent the past few weeks creating complex matrices — schedules for child care, after-school activities, and car pools. But by next week, someone will get sick, or a babysitter will quit, and the house of cards will come tumbling down. Fear not, though: The surgeon general has our back.

A new report from Vivek Murthy classifies parental stress as a public-health problem and proposes a slate of policies to mitigate it. In his words, parenting today often poses “daunting challenges and significant, sometimes relentless, stress.” But Murthy’s medicalization of the problem is unlikely to help, and his nanny-state solutions could make matters worse.

About the Author

Naomi Schaefer Riley

Naomi Schaefer Riley is a senior fellow at the American Enterprise Institute and the author of No Way to Treat a Child.

About the Author

Brad Wilcox

Brad Wilcox, a nonresident fellow at the American Enterprise Institute and a professor of sociology at the University of Virginia, is the author of Get Married: Why Americans Must Defy the Elites, Forge Strong Families, and Save Civilization.