Tuesday, June 28, 2005

Dad's Day Roundup, Part III. Okie dokie ... here's my stab at getting to the bottom of the Father's Day stories. One of the other trends from these stories worth pointing out -- and this was suggested by a poster on one of the at-home dad groups on Yahoo! -- is the true endurance of the term "Mr. Mom." Come up with a smarter but just-as-catchy alternative phrase, and I'll make you rich. And here are the stories:

Sacramento Bee (Reg. Required)
This "portraits" piece is notable for -- yes -- the gorgeous studio photos of the fathers involved, including an at-home dad and a few other very involved fathers. Reading through the at-home dad profile, which mentions the budget struggles that come with being a one-income family, I was struck by how few of these articles tackles that money piece ...

San Jose Mercury News
Not an at-home dad story per se, but a deeper-than-most story about the growing trend towards more involvement and the buildup of fathers in traditionally mom-oriented groups (Mothers Against Drunk Driving, Moms clubs, etc.)

Bremerton (WA) Sun (Reg. required)
A stat-heavy column on modern fatherhood that suggests that men are doing much better in the caring department than ever before ... but that we have a ways to go. The at-home dad angle: SAHDs are the gentlemen leading the charge toward fatherhood involvement, which is a damn fine banner to wave.

Northern Life (Sudbury, Canada)
A good at-home dad profile, but with some Canadian stats to whet my appetite: paternity leave-taking up north is up to 10 percent in 2001 (from 3 percent a decade earlier) and the total number of at-home fathers is at 110,000, up more than 20,000 over ten years. (Not sure how those figures were calculated or where they came from, but that estimate is about the same as the U.S. Census Bureau's estimate for the US (98,000). Of course, we have 10 times the pupation, so either at-home dads are running rampant up there or the Census stats are flawed. And I think you all know where I come down on that.)

Herald and Review (IL)
A standard-issue dad profile, with some nice atmospherics at a local library. It does bring up the Mr. Mom term (in a glowing way, as most of these piece do).

Detroit News
Maybe the best newspaper story on at-home dads, with tons of analysis to underscore the sea change in men's involvement in families, a few wonderful stats and a nice at-home dad in the middle of it all. The stat-head in me was particularly struck by the author's decision to dig out the stat on families where mom is the sole breadwinner. Families like that -- a proxy for at-home dads -- are 2 million nationwide and 64,000 in Michigan ... up 75 percent in the last decade.

Muskegon (MI) Chronicle
And while we're on the subject of Michigan at-home dads, here is a story about another one.

Savannah Morning News (Reg required)
Profile of Boot Camp for New Dads.

Getting tired ...

OK ... I'll have to pull together a fourth update later, so if you're concerned that I have won't get to the at-home dad story from your neck of the woods, don't worry. I'm getting there ...

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