(Deseret News) American parents are less happy than their childless counterparts. And the parenthood “happiness gap” is greater in the United States than in 21 other countries studied, according to a briefing paper prepared for the Council on Contemporary Families.
Researchers wrote they were astonished to discover “the negative effects of parenthood on happiness were entirelyexplained by the presence or absence of social policies allowing parents to better combine paid work with family obligations.”
“The policies that helped parents the most were policies that also improved the happiness of everyone in that country, whether they had children or not,” the report said. “Policies such as guaranteed minimum paid sick and vacation days make everyone happier, but they had an extra happiness bonus for parents of minor children.”
The cure for the happiness gap is “public policy that, in particular cases, combining paid work with parental obligation,” said Robin W. Simon, a sociology professor at Wake Forest University.
