The Summer Parental Investment Gap? Socioeconomic Gaps in the Seasonality of Parental Expenditures and Time with School-Age Children

Abstract

Scholars have theorized how private parental investments of money and time in children may respond differentially to the loss of the public provision of schooling during the summer, based on parental socioeconomic status (SES). Importantly, the widening of SES gaps in parental investments of money and time in children during the summer could generate SES gaps in children’s learning during the summer. We investigate the seasonality of SES gaps in parental investments of both money and time using the 1996–2018 Consumer Expenditure Survey and 2003–2019 American Time Use Survey. We find SES gaps in parental investments of both money and time during the summer and SES gaps in expenditures are larger in the summer than during non-summer months. We find little evidence that these gaps have grown substantially over time, but we do find these gaps are larger for younger school-age children than for older school-age children. This research provides new evidence regarding the link between public and parental investments in children, addresses a key mechanism underlying the debate about the summer learning gap, and provides new evidence on how parents may target investments in children towards the ages when they are most consequential.