Parents in the northwest suburbs have a complaint that sounds too good to be true: Their kids have too much.
They have too many things, too many privileges, too many activities.
”Parents today want to give their kids so much, so much more than we had, and we want them to have nice things and be happy,” said Maria Losacco of Arlington Heights, a mother of three children, ages 6, 4 and 1.
When parents such as Losacco tell what worries them about raising their kids today, they have a list of concerns: saving for their kids` college, keeping their child free of drugs and alcohol, or teaching them about AIDS.
But the worry that their children have too many possessions might sound like a strange complaint. However, for the mostly white middle-class northwest suburbs, it is an issue parents grapple with often. Where do you draw the line?
”It`s partly our fault because we`ve given them so much; we see what goes on around them,” said Losacco, who is 34.
Perhaps parents want to help make life easier for their kids because most think kids growing up today face greater responsibilities.
Almost 80 percent of the parents participating in a Chicago Tribune issues survey of 1,200 people said they think it is tougher to be a kid today, compared with when they were children.
”We`re giving to our kids to satisfy things in us and not in them,”
said Diane Boger, 36.
”They could live with a lot less. All of us are buying these things, and no one has a gun to our back. I want this for my child,” said Boger, whose children are 6, 4 and 2.
Boger, who lives in Arlington Heights, says outright that she buys too many toys, games and playthings for her kids.
”I want them to have everything,” she said.
”If it`s something new and different . . . I get it. I do it as cheaply as possible. I want quantity. I don`t need quality. I want them to experience as many things as possible,” Boger said. Her husband is an actuary, as is she, although she quit her job to raise her children.
”You can give to your children as long as you teach them values along with it,” she said.
Many parents follow that philosophy. They give lessons on the value of money while giving things too. It`s just that each has his or her own version of how much is too much.
For instance, Cinde Bruck of Palatine, whose children are 6, 4 and 1, refuses to buy her kids the latest video game. ”I want them to be doing other things than sitting in front of the TV,” she said.
The parents of 17-year-old Daniel Dick of Hoffman Estates won`t let him buy his own car, even though he has the money to pay for one.
”They say I`ll drive around all the time,” Dick said.
When Bill Accurso and his wife, Diane, took a trip to the Black Hills, he gave his two daughters, ages 8 and 6, $15 to spend on souvenirs, to teach them the value of a dollar.
”It was amazing how they looked things over before they bought,” said Accurso, 40, who lives in Arlington Heights.
Although the Boger home is filled with the newest toy archery set, race cars, toy houses, dolls, a swing, a stroller, a jack-in-the-box and a battery- operated 12-inch-wide spider that crawls across the floor, Diane Boger`s kids don`t get an ice-cream cone whenever they ask for it.
”I argue with them that they can`t ride the pony whenever they come out of the grocery store, so they know they can`t have things just when they ask for them,” Boger said.
Deciding what to let a child have is tough. As Bruck, 33, said, ”You don`t want to have the only kid on the block that is deprived.”
Almost 80 percent of the poll participants thought it was harder to be a parent today, compared with their parents, according to the survey.
”There seems to be a pressure on the parent . . . to work to make money to buy the things you want to buy, and for the kids to learn more faster and to experience all kinds of things as they are growing up,” said Accurso, a regional sales manager for a publishing company.
Growing up in the northwest suburbs can get pretty hectic. Kids have private lessons in music, gymnastics, karate, you name it. There are Scouts, organizations and, of course, soccer.
The northwest suburbs have more kids-about 5,000-involved in soccer than any other area in the state, said Gus Bender, vice president of the Illinois Youth Soccer Association.
And the increasing number of dual-career families also puts a strain on family time together. The number of working mothers has skyrocketed since the days when today`s parents were growing up.
The Tribune poll showed that both parents were working in almost 60 percent of the households with children.
The schedules make time together as a family tough to arrange, given late work hours, meetings, kids` activities and teenagers` part-time jobs. The poll showed that only one-third of families were able to sit down and eat dinner together every night of the week, for instance.
Nonetheless, compared with national figures, the family unit in the northwest suburbs is healthy, the Tribune survey showed.
Of the poll respondents, 72 percent were married, whereas nationally, 56 percent of the population is married, according to the U.S. census.
The survey also showed that 8 percent of participants were divorced or separated, and national census information shows that 11 percent are divorced or living separately.
For their part, kids think that being a kid today is tougher.
”Kids have more responsibility than way back then,” said Daniel Dick.
Like what? ”Everything,” said Dick, with a sweeping gesture of his hand toward his school, Hoffman Estates High School, where he was just finishing classes for the day.
”Most people have their own cars, and the amount some kids are given now, it`s so much,” said Dick, who was casually dressed in jeans and a turquoise shirt.
He is overwhelmed with ”college coming up and applications to mail in and there`s still school to deal with,” not to mention swim team practice, keeping up his honor-roll status and making it home on time for dinner with his parents and younger sister.
Still, there`s no way to prove if it really is harder to be a kid today, compared with a generation ago. The idea is based on subjective
interpretation, not empirical data, experts say.
”Is it really more difficult?” said Daniel Offer, a professor of psychiatry at Northwestern Medical School and director of its adolescent research program.
”It`s different,” said Offer, who has studied suburban high school kids and their parents.
”There are more possibilities, more hopes for the kids,” Offer said.
”The suburban middle class has more activities, work . . . opportunities. But I don`t think it`s more difficult.”
Colleen Janowiak, 17, of Schaumburg thinks it is. And she even has what nearly every teenager wants. Her own car.
All right, so it`s a maroon 1981 Mercury. It`s hers and was given to her by her parents.
”They`ll probably trade it in for a newer one when I go to college,”
she said.
”The things I ask for, I get,” Janowiak said. ”But they balance it out and make me pay for things,” such as the $150 pompon camp she went to recently.
A senior at Schaumburg High School, Janowiak needs the car to get around. She has pompon practice twice a week, dance class three days a week, and she works at a local clothing store, to earn money for gasoline and clothes.
”My parents made me go get a job,” Janowiak said. ”If your parents don`t teach you the value of money, then it`ll be hard later, in the real world.”
