Households, Families and Cultural Capital

Abstract

This chapter focuses on wellbeing within households and families, paying careful attention to child development. This is important from the perspective of the child, of the child's parents, of wider society and globally. Investment in cultural capital enhances wellbeing by creating opportunities for persons to express, develop, transform and pass on to the next generation their cultural inheritance. Men and women can have equal capabilities for wellbeing; yet studies show that significant sacrifices of time and financial costs for parents are carried disproportionately by women, who are also more vulnerable to intimate violence. After accounting for housing costs, nearly one in three children in the United Kingdom are growing up in households with income below 60 per cent of the country's median equivalised income. Thus, the chapter reveals serious problems that can be overlooked when policy advice focuses on economic growth rather than on wellbeing.