Reclaim Dinnertime
An Invitation to Reclaim Dinnertime as Quality Time

We’re all feeling the pressure of our 24/7 lives, a pace that has very real consequences for our families and relationships, our health and our communities.  Here are some of the trends that are contributing to this pressure and how the 24/7 pace impacts us:   

Our Health

  • We are eating on the run, often in the car.1
  • We are not taking the time to exercise.2
  • We are not taking time to socialize with friends and family.  Studies show that social bonding is a leading predictor of overall health.3
  • The obesity rate for both adults and children is at critical levels; we are seeing rising rates of other stress-related diseases, such as heart disease, cancer, depression and diabetes.4
  • We are putting ourselves at risk for high blood pressure. A new study found that psychosocial factors, like work stress, can cause high blood pressure.5
  • Educators report that over-involved children arrive at college burnt out. Overscheduled kids are experiencing stress, anxiety and depression.6

Our Families

  • Intense “activities-first” family schedules can have a high cost for kids, families and communities.7
  • High school students ranked “not having enough time together with parents” as one of their top concerns.8
  • Studies on building stronger families found that9:
  • Parents rank time with children higher than every other factor, including income. 
  • The desire for flexibility in work schedules was also highly ranked.
  • Family members have little unstructured time.
  • Families are being buried in clutter.
  • Families are in flux, rarely coming together.
  • Time is a family value.

Our Leisure Time & Vacations

We are taking fewer vacations:

  • More than one-third of employees (36 percent) had not and was not planning to take their full vacation*.
  • On average, American workers take only 14.6 vacation days annually*.
  • Workers are expected to give back 574 million vacation days this year.10
  • One in four workers plan to work while on vacation this year.11
  • The number of vacation days employees are skipping this year increased by one over last year.12
  • Only 39% of American families took a weeklong vacation in the summer of 2006.13

Work Hours

  • Americans are working longer hours than we did 20 years ago.14
  • One in three American employees is chronically overworked*.
  • Fifty-four percent of American employees have felt overwhelmed at some time in the past month by how much work they had to complete*.
  • Only eight percent of employees who are not overworked experience symptoms of clinical depression compared with 21 percent of those who are highly overworked*.

Technology

  • Keeps us connected to work at all hours of the day/night/weekend*.
  • Our fast-paced technology culture has contributed to the expectation that we should all move fast and produce at a machine’s pace. Even if workers aren’t working more, they feel like they are because of the expectation that everything should be done immediately*.
  • Reduces our face-to-face connections*.

*All information sourced from www.familiesandwork.org


1 NPD Worldwide, “Eating Patterns in America”; http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/10154905/
2 FDA: "More than half of all Americans don't get the recommended amount of physical activity." http://www.fda.gov/fdac/features/2005/305_eat.html#exercise
3 SOCIAL ISOLATION IN AMERICA, http://www.asanet.org/galleries/default-file/June06ASRFeature.pdf
4 FDA: "more Americans than ever are overweight, obese, and at increased risk for chronic diseases such as heart disease, high blood pressure, diabetes, and certain cancers." http://www.fda.gov/fdac/features/2005/305_eat.html
5 American Heart Association
6 KidsHealth KidsPoll on "Are Kids Too Busy?" conducted by the Department of Health Education and Recreation, Southern Illinous University, Carbondale. IL.  2006
7 Robert Putnam, Bowling Alone: The Collapse and Revival of American Community.  New York: Simon and Schuster, 2000.
8 Global Strategy Group, Inc., "Talking With Teens: The YMCA Parent and Teen Survey."  Final Report, April, 2000.
9 YMCA and Search-Institute: Building Stronger Families, 2004; The Center for Everyday Lives of the Family at UCLA)
10 Expedia.com
11 CareerBuilder.com
12 Expedia.com
13 http://www.conference-board.org/utilities/pressDetail.cfm?press_ID=2906
14 Juliet Schor – The Overworked American; Also Schor’s chapter in the Take Back Your Time Handbook (editor, John de Graaf, “The (Even More) Overworked American, 2003