COLLECTION • FEBRUARY 10, 2021
Home Building
Foreword: One Generation Away
Preserving our national inheritance requires public policy to get the family right.
Home Building Survey Part I: State of the American Family
Across all classes and regardless of parental status, 60 to 75% of Americans say that the government should do more to support families.
Home Building Survey Part II: Supporting Families
American attitudes about family structure vary widely, but most families see a full-time earner and a stay-at-home parent as the ideal arrangement for raising young children.
Why Bother With Family?
If conservatives do not speak for the family, who will?
Our Conjugal Class Divide
Marriage has evolved to meet the ideals of the well-educated and left too many Americans unwed and insecure.
Family Form Follows Function
Effective family policy begins from the institution’s ultimate roles and purposes.
Escaping the Parent Trap
Addressing America’s fertility crisis happens to be what parents want.
Canucks in the Cradle
Canadian Conservatives successfully championed universal child benefits and have lessons for their neighbors to the south.
The Family Income Supplemental Credit
This paper presents the case for a per-child family benefit that would operate as a form of reciprocal social insurance paid only to working families.
Reactions to a New Social Compact
Commentators and policy analysts react to our proposal for a Family Income Supplemental Credit.
Overview
American family life has long been associated with the “white picket fence,” a symbol of twentieth-century, middle-class nostalgia. Such ideals are better reflected not by the fence, but the home it surrounded: in which families found shelter and security, parents raised children, and wealth was built up and passed down. That home has fallen into disrepair. Fewer people are getting married; fewer children are being born; and they are more likely to be raised by single parents. Conservatives must embrace the task of rebuilding it.
Home Building offers a blueprint for buttressing the American family. A survey of parenting-age Americans assessed the family’s state, priorities, and preferences as well as its policy attitudes. Opening essays by Helen Andrews, Kay Hymowitz, Patrick T. Brown, and Lyman Stone explain why conservatives need a positive family policy suited to the needs and interests of the American people. American Compass’s Oren Cass and Wells King weigh the arguments for improving family benefits and offer a new proposal, with responses from experts across the political spectrum. Essays by Sean Speer and Neil Gilbert offer lessons learned about crafting and implementing family policy from abroad, while Michael Lind and Samuel Hammond widen the scope for family policy to transform existing programs and approaches to reform. A range of other experienced policy experts offer potential pathways for reform as well.
