Has Childhood Gotten Too Long?

Childhood used to be short. Kids worked on the family farm starting when they could do small jobs, like feed the chickens before school and do chores like help with the haying and milking after school. There were small children working in coal mines and factories in the late 1800’s and early 1900’s. Child labor and compulsory education laws were made that stopped those practices, but some kids still had after school jobs and summer jobs, not for extras, but to help support the family. My grandfather and late father-in-law had to leave school before the 12th grade when their fathers died, so they could take over as breadwinners for their families. At least some in my generation worked part-time jobs to pay for our own “extras,” like clothes and saved money to buy books and supplies for college. We worked close to home, so we could walk or ride bikes to our jobs. Most of us did not have cars. I didn’t even have a driver’s license until my senior year in college, since I had no car to drive anyway. My children did not have cars of their own until they got full time jobs after college. If they wanted special things, they had to work to get the money for them.

Something changed over the years. It seems to me children went from being children to being status symbols for their parents. Oh, there were a few of my classmates who at least had access to a car and a very few who had cars their parents provided for them, usually Dad’s old car when he bought his new one. There may have been really rich parents who bought their children new cars while the kids were still…