Help families meet their basic needs

Utah takes pride in being a "family values" state, but as Mark Twain said to his wife when she cursed to show him how bad it sounded, "You may have the lyrics, but you don't have the rhythm."

We may have the right intentions, but the solutions are short-sighted.

If we are serious about promoting family values, then we need policies that strengthen families, rather than replacing the role of parents with social programs and more laws that "protect the family." Our families are in trouble. While some may label them as "dysfunctional," in reality, they are under siege, under stress and need help, not more laws or bureaucracies through which they must navigate.

Today, there are more single- and two-parent working families struggling to earn a living, many holding two jobs, in a workplace where security is a thing of the past and jobs are constantly changing or disappearing. These include single parents, mostly women, who may be widowed or divorced and often lack the skills to obtain a job that pays a living wage. More families lack affordable health care, and fewer employers can afford to provide health benefits for their employees. Many families face the same problems. They are overworked, worried about jobs, the mortgage, the rent, college tuition and child care — and stressed to the max.

Some of our elected leaders seem to think the biggest threats to families are TV, the Internet and same-sex marriage. They propose a variety of laws to protect families. Today, "protecting" families in this manner may not be enough. Parents need help in meeting basic needs in today's economy. More laws only add to the "helping services industrial complex" — child care, child protection and workfare, to name a few. The result is that we have created a host of programs and therapies, specializing in almost every human problem but dealing mainly with symptoms rather than causes.

What is lacking is a coherent set of policies designed to strengthen families in a comprehensive way. What we have now is a hodgepodge of unrelated policies that have no purpose and, in some instances, are anti-family.