The Unfinished Revolution: How a New Generation is Reshaping Family, Work, and Gender in America

by Kathleen Gerson

If family form provides such limited clues about how children view their family experiences, what does? Across different family forms, the work-family strategies of parents (and other caretakers) are central to shaping the direction of their family pathway.16 Most families faced unanticipated events that undermined rigidly divided ways of organizing breadwinning and caretaking. Gender flexibility gave all types of families a wider array of options and resources to respond to these challenges. The ability and willingness to cross and blur the boundaries between earning a living and caring for others provides the key to understanding why some homes became more supportive and others less so.