The Pandemic Could Undo Decades of Parenting Gains

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Mother walking daughter to school amid COVID-19.

Over the past 30 years, a positive development for America's young children has been the convergence in parenting trends between economically advantaged and disadvantaged parents. But now, with low-income parents facing the brunt of the pandemic, that progress is at risk.

In a new analysis, Rebecca Ryan, Ariel Kalil, Susan Mayer, and Rohen Shah explain how three key pillars of parenting—economic stability, parental mental health, and support for children's learning—have been shaken by the COVID-19 crisis.

Separately, we examine the issue of public trust in a coronavirus vaccine, the importance of real-time data during pandemics, and the mounting challenges for people whose jobs haven't come back.

Will Americans trust a COVID-19 vaccine? With politics threatening to undermine confidence in a vaccine, Sarah Kreps and Douglas Kriner say that scientists and public-health experts should be the ones to share the facts on potential COVID-19 treatments.

Centralizing data for pandemic responses. Data sharing has proved to be incredibly valuable during the current crisis, but data collection efforts remain fragmented. Stephanie Chin and Caitlin Chin call for the establishment of a common data space for highly infectious diseases.

The jobs that haven't come back. The large number of workers transitioning out of the U.S. labor market is a sign of structural damage to the nation’s economy, Stephanie Aaronson and Wendy Edelberg argue.

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