Parentonomics ─ An Economist Dad Looks at Parenting

Like any new parent, Joshua Gans felt joy mixed with anxiety upon the birth of hisfirst child. Who was this blanket-swaddled small person and what did she want? Unlike most parents,however, Gans is an economist, and he began to apply the tools of his trade to raising his children.He saw his new life as one big economic management problem-- and if economics helped him think aboutparenting, parenting illuminated certain economic principles. Parentonomics is the entertaining,enlightening, and often hilarious fruit of his "research." Incentives, Gans shows us, areas risky in parenting as in business. An older sister who is recruited to help toilet train heryounger brother for a share in the reward given for each successful visit to the bathroom, forexample, could give the trainee drinks of water to make the rewards more frequent. (Economics lateroffered another, better toilet training solution: outsourcing. For their third child, Gans and hiswife put it in the hands of professionals--the day care providers.) Gans gives us the parentonomicview of delivery (if the mother shares her pain by yelling at the father, doesn't it really createmore aggregate pain?), sleep (the screams of a baby are like an offer: "I'll stop screaming ifyou give me attention"), food (a question of marketing), travel ("the best thing you cansay about traveling with children is that they are worse than baggage"), punishment (and threatcredibility), birthday party time management, and more. Parents: if you're reading Parentonomics inthe presence of other people, you'll be unable to keep yourself from reading the funny parts outloud. And if you're reading it late at night and wake a child with your laughter--well, you'll havesome guidelines for negotiating a return to bed.

Mahmood Karimi-Hakak, Artistic Director of Mahak International Artists, Inc.,has written, produced, directed, designed, and/or acted in over 40 stage and screen productionsin the U.S., Europe, and his native Iran. His literary credits include fiveplays, two books of poetry, several translations from and into Persian, and numerousarticles and interviews both in English and Persian. Dr. Hakak has taught at such universitiesas Towson, CUNY, SMU here in the U.S., as well as universities in Belgiumand Iran. At present he serves as Associate Professor and Producer of the Theatre Seriesat Siena College, New York.