End the Plague of Secret Parenting

I’m an economist. I love data and evidence. I love them so much that I write books about data-based parenting. When questions arise about how to support parents at work (for example, from Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez on Twitter), my first impulse is to endorse paid parental leave. Mountains of data and evidence show that paid leave is good for children’s health, and for mothers in particular. I am more than comfortable making a data-based case for this policy.

But experience, rather than pure data, leads me to believe that what happens after paid leave is nearly as crucial—that is to say, what happens when Mom and Dad return to the office. We need to normalize the experience of parenting while working.    

For the past few weeks, I’ve been talking with parents—mostly women—about all, focuses on using data to make parenting decisions.) One thing I heard much more than I would have liked, and more than I would have expected, was that parents feel the need to hide or minimize the evidence of their children at the office.