You have data around making us a good Parent and I don't even know how you how Do we even measure how what do you say Is good how to even measure that yeah so That's another area where I you know there's obviously a lot of Different measure measures but one of The things that's surprising in the data Is how little overall parents matter So you would think I think both parents I'm not a parent but also I just want to Apologize I wasn't dising the account Answer or the ones on the one to ten Scale or the shorter guys I'm just Presenting the data that's why I always Say that when I have I said listen it's Not that there's anything wrong against This group that group like I we have Happy and unhappy retiree traits and one Of them I think one of them showed up on The unhappy retiree list was hunting and I remember like getting real feedback Like that's bull you know and I was like No no no I always it's data that's not What I think this is the data says Exactly Uh so anyway so the first thing in Parenting in the data parenting is that The overall effects of parents the way They study this is p adopties so Sometimes people are there are these Adoption programs where it's kind of Randomly determined uh what who ends up Who your parent ends up being and
It turns out kind of parents matter Overall to much less than just about Everybody thinks on most Dimensions Income education there are a few things You can influence uh one of the things You can influence most actually Is how your kids think of you do they Think they had good parents so you can't Change how educated they are how rich They are how happy they are but you can Change you know how they think of you Which is something that is pretty Valuable to most to most parents but so You know some of the big things again Education income happiness parents don't Really influence things values uh Parents aren't having a huge impact So you know all these decisions we sweat About when you actually look at the Overall effect the effect just isn't That big That said uh there is one decision that Parents make that may have kind of a Disproportionate impact and that's where Parents raise their kids so there's all This research again from tax data which Is just becoming available to Researchers that where kids grow up just Can dramatically impact any outcome we Can measure in tax data so how educated They are how rich they are Where they you know have have kids as a Teenager a neighborhood really does Matter for uh parents and what is it
About a good neighborhood like why are Certain neighborhoods uh really good Yeah we're like what's good yeah we can Also compare it to other facts about the Neighborhood it turns out a lot of the Things you think might really matter so You know Great Schools or boobing Economy those don't really matter a lot That much at all the things that really Seem to better are The qualities of the people in the Neighborhood do people are two percent Of two parent homes uh Percent of people with college degrees Percent of people return their census Forms a very very random Measure but it seems to be something About adult Role Models giving your kids Good adult role models and there's Actually also studies that if you have a Daughter if you raise her around a lot Of female scientists She's more likely to become a female a Scientist herself when she grows up So I think we don't think how much the Other adults were exposing our kids to Are impacting them and uh you know how They turn out uh you know and even you Know apart from the actual place you Live the city you live the block you Live who are you exposing your kids to Like are these people you want them to Turn out to be I think one one kind of Thing one of the reasons that parenting
Is overrated but neighborhoods are Underrated Is kids have complicated views about Their parents so sometimes kids think Their parents are the coolest people Sometimes kids think their parents are The the least cool people the people They don't want to be the people they Want to rebel against But neighborhoods kids tend to think They're pretty cool regardless so they May rebel against you but they're not Necessarily going to rebel against other People you expose them to so I kind of Recommend Outsourcing parents parenting A little bit expose your kids to people You want them to turn into
