Emily Oster mentioned on a podcast [1] that although she enjoys spending time with her kids much more than she enjoys working, the marginal value of kid time declines while the marginal value of work remains steady. In my experience a lot of parents feel this way. We may agree that the intrinsic value of family is much higher than that of work or the economy, but spending too much time with one's kids can feel like a drain at a certain point, even for very loving parents. At that point, the parent probably isn't doing anything great for the kids. It's good to have another outlet.

[1] https://newbooksnetwork.com/emily-oster-cribsheet-a-data-dri...