Who's the boss here?

I heard an interesting report on one of my favorite morning talk shows that contended that there has been a power switch in American families over the last 50 years. Kids seem to have the bulk of the power in families, and (I thought this was interesting) it seems to be directly related to parents spending more time with their children. I think I would have guessed that parents spend less time with their kids than when I was growing up, since families often include two working parents. Of course when I think about it I and many of my friends grew up in households with two working parents. However it seems that the time spent driving kids to and from events, etc. counts as time together. I really wasn't too surprised to hear this report. My daughter-in-law teaches a sociology class and, from time to time, invites senior citizens like myself to come in and meet in small groups with the students and compare notes on life now and then.  At one such meeting I was at a table with one other older adult and five students. At one point in the conversation I made the comment that when I was young my dad and mom were definitely the authority figures. I joked about my father's "master sergeant" voice that you simply didn't argue with. What they said went and there was no back sass. The other adult chimed in in agreement, talking about a very similar life style in her family. This seemed very natural to both of us but the students looked at us like we had just sprouted two heads or something. The comments from the kids included "Boy, it's not like that now.", "I argue with my mom all the time." "I pretty much get to do what I want." and other similar sentiments. It's an interesting situation. Do we blame it on Dr. Spock or was that too long ago to count?