That's Penelope Trunk, noting a new Forbes survey that says 84% of working women want to stay home with kids. Forbes notes that "more than one in three resent their partner for not earning enough to make that dream a reality." Resentment is a bad place to be. I like these 2 items from Trunk's advice:
Live below your means.
You know at age 23 if it’s likely that you’ll want to stay home with kids. Which means the minute you get married you should adjust your spending for one income....
Pick your spouse carefully.Are people of today able to do and say such things? It seems radical and dangerous. But resentment... resentment is slow-growing and corrosive.
If you want to stay home with kids, don’t marry a guy who can’t earn a living. If you want to stay home with kids, make it clear that even though you earn more than the guy, the guy will be the breadwinner. If you want to stay home with kids then you put all your financial hopes in the guy’s career. Whatever his earning ability is, then that is your earning ability, because you are a team, and he is the breadwinner.
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149 comments:
more than one in three resent their partner for not earning enough to make that dream a reality
Funny, I don't resent my wife for not allowing me to be a stay-at-home dad.
Must be a women thang.
Live below your means...
Pick your spouse carefully.
Double bingo for Penelope Trunk!
She can worry about "bingo wings" later...there are exercises and surgeries for that.
Are people of today able to do and say such things? It seems radical and dangerous.
Sure.
I'll go one further. After you've both made that decision together, quit your job when you have a baby. Never make a single mention or foray into the world of, "Well, maybe I could go back for a little while if..."
Think about this from the perspective of a young woman's parents. How much of their money should they put into a daughter's education versus a son's?
I was a stay-at-home non-Mom for two years. I loved it. Except when working women contemptuously asked, "What do you do all day?"
The other thing, if you decide to stay home, is that you need to support your spouse like steel. You are a steel pillar of supportiveness that cannot be moved. That makes all the difference, I think.
Anecdote:
A friend of mine has a wife who finished an MBA just over a year ago who has no interest in working whatsoever. They don't even have children yet and she stays at home.
Think about this from the perspective of a young woman's parents. How much of their money should they put into a daughter's education versus a son's?
What does the daughter want?
If she stays home, she'll be the one raising and influencing the grandchildren. That is enormously valuable.
And the feminazis, of course, sneer ar Grandma's dictum, "Marry in haste, repent at leisure".
Ms Trunk has just freshened it up a bit.
This line Forbes notes that "more than one in three resent their partner for not earning enough to make that dream a reality." should make Axelrod and Plouffe worried.
Sounds like a lot of women, married and single, want a big change in the economy.
Now.
My wife actually has the opposite problem. She's a working mom who doesn't fit in with the rest of the neighborhood stay-at-home moms.
They don't seem to understand why she works.
Are people of today able to do and say such things? It seems radical and dangerous.
It's extremely common here in Manhattan and Brooklyn. Single women say so all of the time on OkCupid- successful educated career women in their 30s. You're a long shot if you make the same income, and it's a nonstarter if you make less. I believe the term deadbeat is bandied about.
I was a stay-at-home non-Mom for two years. I loved it. Except when working women contemptuously asked, "What do you do all day?"
Ha!!! I did a posting on this topic on my blog almost exactly one year ago.
What did I do today now that I'm retired.
Strangely enough, this day today is very much like last year's day. I'm not in the least bit bored.
In fact when I first heard of your engagement to Meade I wondered how it would be possible for you to get past the issue. I'm still kind of amazed by it.
Well, I don't want my sons marrying uneducated ignoramuses. I will be thrilled if my daughters-in-law decide to stay home with the kids. An education is not a purely money-making endeavor. Or at least, it shouldn't be.
A friend of mine likes to say, "Expectations are premeditated resentments."
Set your goals accordingly.
"I was a stay-at-home non-Mom for two years. I loved it. Except when working women contemptuously asked, "What do you do all day?""
I would have so many good answers to that question -- with just as much contemptuousness as I received -- based on the concept that the person asking is quite dull. I never have a problem coming up with things to do in my free time. I'd be perfectly happy reading all day if I had nothing else to do.
The answer is the classic answer to most mean things other people say: That says more about the person saying it than it does about you.
DBQ, that's great. My days would be similar, and there would be many hours spent knitting.
Also. I add another item to Trunk's list that dovetails with the "live-below-your-means" advice: Nourish a generous emergency fund. You should have at least eighteen months of cash squirreled away for the day your husband loses his job.
Althouse, this was back in the day (before middle age) when I danced around what I said to people.
My advice to my own daughters will be to work until the babies come, but sock away every last cent of it, and live only on their husband's income.
"In fact when I first heard of your engagement to Meade I wondered how it would be possible for you to get past the issue. I'm still kind of amazed by it."
What are you talking about? We have adult children and we can't have any more.
There are no children to stay home with.
I'm a big supporter of the single-earner home (especially when there are children), but it doesn't have to be the wife who stays home. It's a choice that can be made.
It's certainly true that a married couple is a single economic unit. You have to figure out for yourselves how to structure your time and money. Most people aren't too smart about that.
As for me and opting out of work -- I can retire whenever I want. That's been true for a while.
I'm torn about the stay-at-home thing since I've done it. Dividing up the roles of a domestic partnership makes sense. And it's incredibly important to appreciate the person who goes out to work every day.
OTOH, lots of men are really great with kids, even really little kids, maybe even better than mothers sometimes. And I wonder, if mothers want to stay home for the care giving if it isn't sometimes because they don't trust their husband with parenting. And that's bad, if you have a stay-at-home parent or not.
Not having sitters and day care and having that direct parent involvement all the time, that's great. But if you don't trust the other parent to do it as good as you, you've got a problem.
The grass is always greener...
Libbers have screwed everything up, eh? Now, what was taditional is radical?
Heh.
DBQ, that's great. My days would be similar, and there would be many hours spent knitting.
LOL...It is too hot to knit. My projects are in a basket, but I am making some aprons. I got a really good pattern from a friend.
Instead of plum bread, I'm making plum custard kuchen. And....when it comes out of the oven, the Dumbplumber is taking me to lunch.
Other than that.....pretty much the same. I love it.
You don't need a rich husband to be a housewife. My husband earns less than 100K for a family of 6. We live BENEATH our means and buy what we can afford. We are black and Obama's target base, we are center right and voting for Romney.
More of the moocher mentality. I fear for where this country is going. Obama proudly campaigns as the pro-moocher President and he's winning handily.
I wonder how much of this is driven by kids like me, who grew up in daycare, and said no way are my kids going through that.
Of course, maybe it will be proven than kids of stay-at-home moms are more likely to be wimps without the hard-knock lonely life of the day care or latchkey kids. Maybe my grandkids will go back to daycare so they won't be soft.
I'm really curious about Plum Bread, DBQ. I made some banana bread the other day because I had overripe bananas and didn't want to throw them away, but then I decieded I prefer pumpkin bread! I love plum jelly, though.
My advice to my own daughters will be to work until the babies come, but sock away every last cent of it, and live only on their husband's income.
This is what my parents did.
We did it. Something agreed upon pre-pregnency and in principle pre-marriage. (Very old fashioned I know). Not easy to give up that much income, but all the two earners did with theirs is spend more on clothes, food, and vacations not to mention day care. By now the kids know it was a good deal and we never made an issue of it to friends. One of those things that people, on both sides, can be too defensive about.
Freeman Hunt: take all your paid baby leave (if you have it)
THEN quit.
I'm really curious about Plum Bread, DBQ.
Italian Prune Plum Bread Here you go. It is really more like a pound cake in a loaf pan than it is bread. Also better the next day. Easier to cut.
I'll report back on my Plum Custard Kuchen if anyone is interested.
:-)
I didn't mean the kids part, I just mean the (presumed) difference in finances and career background.
I know only a handful of couples where the wife has a higher-paying or more prestigious career. Most seem to work it out but several did not. Not for just those reasons but they did play a part. While the couple may have been fine privately their social circles meshed not at all. Usually it was the wife's colleagues ignoring the husband at social events or even openly snubbing them. Eventually the wife assumed a controlling role in the relationship and had less respect for her spouse.
The husband were/are professionals as well but not executives. An attorney or ad exec is not willing to settle for an editor or designer at a small publisher, let alone a school teacher or sommelier.
None of these couples have kids either.
but for some time now moms don't have the luxury really to stay at home, in the sense of staying put, especially if they are really fulltime moms
beyond groceries and other management tasks that require getting out, once the kids start school and wanting to see friends and activities – being awake and house stationary is a temporary condition
I'm a very lucky SAHM to a 2 year old. My wife (yes wife) works in the intel world here in the DC suburbs. We live way below our means for being part of the "rich". We've paid off both cars, paid off student loans and save all we can. (It probably helps that we're a little older as parents.)
To only slightly change the topic - this is where gay marriage matters. Because we're not married, and yet I stay home and therefore have no income, I also have rapidly diminishing credit. I doubt I'd even be able to buy a car on my own now. God forbid we ever split (been together over 13 years so far) I'd be in a world of hurt that most straight women wouldn't be.
If you have two full-time incomes, you really should be saving almost entirely all of one of them. That's what I'd say is a general rule. But otherwise, what works for one family will not work for another.
Also, it's easier to have kids younger than older. Don't wait 'til your mid-30s. Have 'em when you're 20something so that a lot of your life is left when they leave the house.
As a result of divorce, I wound up working full-time, as well as being the primary placement parent of a 5 1/2 year old boy. He lives with me about 66% of the time.
I still would like to find a relationship and this has put me back on the dating market at the age of 36.
The truly bizarre thing to me is that there are 2 primary categories of women in this market.
1. Divorced or never married with kids.
2. Single, never married, no kids and roughly my age (+/-5 years).
In category #2; single, married, no kids; what I've found is that if the woman falls into this category, there is a reason for it, and it is a reason that will automatically disqualify her from further consideration by me as a partner. It will, also, almost certainly disqualify her from being a stay-at-home mom as well.
There has to be a lesson in this as we raise this generation of boys and girls...
Being a stay-at-home mother in America is the most lucrative job in the world. The husband slaves and sacrifices for years – perhaps decades -- at a career he probably hates to provide for his family. The stay-at-home mother, then having changed her inconstant mind again (after being told time and time again she “can have it all”), decides she’s unhappy at home. So she divorce rapes the poor sap, destroys her family, devastates the kids, and separates father from child.
No wonder unhappy women want in on the gravy train.
Are people of today able to do and say such things?
You won't be able to say such things here much longer. It's probably already illegal in Canada.
..live below your means...pick your spouse carefully...
I know there are plenty who don't follow it, but does anyone really dispute that this is good advice?
My mother always told me to learn to live on one income. That's what she and my dad did and they did fine. So we did that when we got married we lived on my husband's income and saved mine. When the kids came it wasn't hard to make the transition to stay at home mom. When the kids grew up, I went back to work briefly, but hated the corporate life. So I quit and now choose to stay home. My days are full and I am happy.
"Also, it's easier to have kids younger than older. Don't wait 'til your mid-30s. Have 'em when you're 20something so that a lot of your life is left when they leave the house."
Having had two kids in our late 30s, my response to this is - Preach it Brother Madison. Seriously - it will never be the "right time", but the older you are the more getting up in the middle of the night will really suck.
My wife works and most of the women in our town don't. She definitely gets some attitude for it.
I have only sons, but if I knew that a child was planning on a being a stay at home spouse, I'd definitely be more chary with the tuition funds. If you want to "find yourself", here's an airline ticket, a Eurail pass and $10,000. Come home and get a job when you find yourself or you run out of money. Much cheaper than a 4 year degree.
"pduggie said...
Freeman Hunt: take all your paid baby leave (if you have it)
THEN quit. "
Ummm...paid baby leave? What's that?
"I didn't mean the kids part, I just mean the (presumed) difference in finances and career background."
You don't know the details about Meade, though, do you?
"I know only a handful of couples where the wife has a higher-paying or more prestigious career. Most seem to work it out but several did not. Not for just those reasons but they did play a part. While the couple may have been fine privately their social circles meshed not at all. Usually it was the wife's colleagues ignoring the husband at social events or even openly snubbing them. Eventually the wife assumed a controlling role in the relationship and had less respect for her spouse."
I agree that reversed gender roles can cause a lot more problems than people who think they are modern and enlightened are able to predict, but I'm kind of an unusual person in a lot of ways. Plus I'm old and I've been married before. I have my outlook on things, and I really didn't think I could even tolerate living with somebody at all. But I can't reveal enough details to explain.
The kind of people you describe -- the snubbers -- are not people I'd be circling with in the first place. I'm kind of an artist and a hippie.
Meade's dream of being a stay at home hubby came true by marrying Ann Althouse who is a stay at home professor engaged in tenure abuse and taking the taxpayers of Wisconson for over $160,000.00 a year while barely working.
Sheesh, Jay Retread, why such animosity to Althouse and Meade?
Jay Retread = typical librul loser who resents and is jealous of the success and wealth of others.
Ann Althouse said...
As for me and opting out of work -- I can retire whenever I want. That's been true for a while.
That helps explain why you don't much mind Obama. You are one of those who will be fine, no matter what shambles he leaves the country, and the rest of us, in.
CouponMom said:
You don't need a rich husband to be a housewife. My husband earns less than 100K for a family of 6. We live BENEATH our means and buy what we can afford. We are black and Obama's target base, we are center right and voting for Romney.
This gives me hope for the country's future on so many levels.
My wife is a stay-at-home mom and has been since she was 6 months pregnant with our first child. Women colleagues are shocked that she doesn't at least get a part-time job now that both children are in full days of school. They can't figure out what she does all day.
But she keeps the house extremely clean, does the grocery shopping and much of the cooking, runs errands, gets the girls off to school every day while I am commuting to work, cares for them when they are home sick, gets all their homework done with them before I walk in the door each night, takes them to do fun activities, volunteers at their school and in our church, etc, etc, etc.
I love it this way. When I am home from work I have my fair share of projects to do. But much of my time can be spent relaxing, exercising, reading, spending quality time with my girls, etc. I can't figure out how parents with both spouses working have time to do anything but more household work in the evenings or on the weekends. I will trade the extra income for the extra time any day of the week. In fact, our plan is for her to continue to stay at home after the girls grow up. We are both very happy with the arrangement and worked our butts off to make it possible.
"Whatever his earning ability is, then that is your earning ability, because you are a team, and he is the breadwinner."
We're in it together. That has to be the attitude.
My wife just quit her job a few weeks ago to be with our daughter full time.
I've been a full time student for the last few years, earning income but not livable. So her salary kept us fed and housed.
Now I'm working (teaching 4 classes as an adjunct), which is barely livable, but it is. She could have gone back to work, but we realized her job would have paid for 2nd car and child care--with not much left over.
We're definitely struggling, but we have a decent, if not ideal, place to live. And more importantly because we see that we're in this together no matter who is making the money, the other person takes up the slack and we create (and re-create) expectations accordingly.
This is a great area that shows where we find our identity. We both very much like who we are, we both really like the other person for who they are, we trust in God that we're not just going down a meaningless road, so we're able to press forward with hope, even when our present decisions carry with it associated struggles.
Life is indeed good.
"Whatever his earning ability is, then that is your earning ability, because you are a team, and he is the breadwinner."
We're in it together. That has to be the attitude.
Exactly!! In my first marriage it was like only one of us (ME!) was pulling the plow while the other (supposedly) team member was on a completely other agenda.
My current marriage (over 18 years now) we are a team. We work together and have divisions of labor as well. Helping and encouraging each other. We have each other's back and stand together. We are appreciative of what each of us brings to the relationship.
Night and day.
"You don't know the details about Meade, though, do you?"
Which is why I included "presumed" in my sentence.
One of the couples that I have in mind are academics- the wife is a PHD candidate in Sociology at Columbia while her husband is working at a mid-level job as a soil scientist.
Her friends mostly snub him for only having a bachelor's degree. People in their 30s with few job prospects do this. She can't understand why he passes on socializing with her friends.
I am trying to tell my daughters that they can fall in love with a rich man just as easily as they can a poor one...
BUST through the glass ceiling
BUST through the glass ceiling
BUST through the glass ceiling
Without working 80 hours a week
It's only JUST!
BUST through the glass ceiling
BUST through the glass ceiling
BUST through the glass ceiling
Without getting (reality tweak)
Your hair MUSSED.
"Im gonna guess you got covered by some working taxpayers in your full time student pursuits"
Yes... my wife. I thought I mentioned that.
Also, I had a full fellowship, so no tuition. At my age, that's why I went back. They paid for it. The school did, not loans. Not a state or public school.
Also I worked, enough to cover extras.
So, there you go.
YES.. Have your children while you are still young. Not only will you have the required energy to take care of them, when they leave the nest you will still be young enough to have a full and exciting life as a happy empty nester.
Unfortunately, you don't realize how much your child needs you, and how much you like being there for your child, until you have a child. The good thing about socialism is that it wouldn't take 80 hour work weeks to bust through the glass ceiling.
I don't know how it's state subsidized, when the state is not paying for stuff.
When my wife loses her benefits at the end of the month we're paying for our own insurance.
And, believe it or not, I'm paying taxes even as an adjunct professor working at a private university.
It's not bragging, it's stating, and it's certainly not bragging as our choices bring with it other sacrifices. So, it's more expressing our values... as conservatives.
Yes, we can take this leap because of a wee safety net. Our families are supportive and if we had a financial emergency we could get loans from them. As we would do in return if and when we are able.
No state involved. Except in taking money out of my paychecks... oh and making student insurance $600 more expensive per quarter because of Obamacare and pushing us to find an insurance broker that gives us adequate insurance for a reasonable price.
Well, I do have to get on the freeway and use roads and street lights and stuff to get to my work. So, I guess I'm subsidized that way. If there weren't roads, though, it would actually make a rather shorter straight-line to get there, so my horse wouldn't take me too much longer than the roads and freeways (which force me to travel in pre-ordained detours).
"my wife is one of the most strong-willed women I have ever met. She hated working and loves being a mom. If she chooses to go to work, then I would support her. But you just can't stand the fact that we are both content with the arrangement."
Mine too. Before we were married, she lived in France for 5 years after college on her own--is fluent in French, wrote songs, released several CDs, worked in a variety of fields and otherwise lived a very full life. She worked while we were first married at a job that wasn't her favorite and now she gets to do that which she has long wanted to do, be a mom. Had she wanted to keep working I would have supported her with that too. That's how much I like her.
We both come from an educated working class background, and so we're people who can enjoy life, be thoughtful about it, and not have to fill it with a competition of stuff. In Southern California, even.
Life is good and so is God.
Jesus H Christ
Lots of bitterness floating around. I give Ann and Meade shit making money running a tea-bagger fanboy site, but damn. Can't you idiots see that for a couple old retreads, they have found some awesome happiness together. I wish Meade would rustle me up some of that great grub we get to see occasionally.
That's great. How can anyone be upset because someone else is happy and enjoying love on the down-slope to oblivion. The world is a better place when people are happy.
Talk about bitter clingers. Living on loneliness and hatred for others who you think might be having some fun is much worse than oiling guns and swallowing religion whole.
Get some help, please. With Obasmacare, it's free and easy!
"Get my drift?"
Very much. You're one of those people.
Life is hard, so bitterness against others keeps you going. You live to undermine the choices of others to somehow make yourself feel more virtuous. You twist and finagle facts to fit into your preconceived notions, even when your notions turn out to be utterly wrong. But that's all you have, bitterness. So people who enjoy life, who are free and living free in the midst of their decisions, people who are committed not only to themselves but to the next generation (which is worth much more than a road), must be degraded.
Life is indeed good, but not when you bathe in bitterness.
That makes life sad. And if that's all you see in life--well, that's sad too.
"pay one's own way so young on such a lifestyle?"
She worked. Worked before and worked while in France. Her dad had died of cancer.
It doesn't cost a lot of money to live somewhere else. Just a result of choices.
Bitterness always leads to bad assumptions of others. Very sad.
Free yourself!!
1. Live below your means
2. Pick your spouse carefully
3. Demand government fully support you in comfort as a stay-at-home mom?
This is (I think) pretty much what some Scandanavian countries have done.
Of course, the difference between the two is, the first is a voluntary, private arrangement and the second requires coerced "contributions."
Wow, how does one maintain their indpendence and pay one's own way so young on such a lifestyle?
There is this thing you may have heard of.....it is called working.
I moved out on my own when I was 19. Moved to San Francisco, had my own apartment, went to Europe several times, Mexico, traveled a bunch, bought my own car, went to college as well. I lived the life I wanted to live. Was it a life of luxury. Not really. The trade off was that it was a happy life.
You are just being bitter about the failings in your own life and projecting your prejudices upon others.
My life now that I am a stay at home wife is very happy. I love being a housewife, cooking, cleaning (well maybe not so much the cleaning), doing the bookwork for my husband's business, participating in community activities and volunteering. I wish that I could have been a stay at home mom when my daughter was young. But...we all have to play the cards we are dealt.
Details are telling.
Yes, they are, and one of the details is that PaddyO and his wife have a brand new baby and she wants to stay home to take care of her child and they are willing to sacrifice some income and material goodies to be able to do that.
Small detail, yet important in making the decision.
It is a shame that you were evidently raised by uncaring strangers, otherwise you might not be so jealous of other people's happiness.
I don't recall anyone bragging about deductions.
"That helps explain why you don't much mind Obama. You are one of those who will be fine, no matter what shambles he leaves the country, and the rest of us, in."
If Obama leaves the country in the shambles he's shown himself to be capable of, no one will be fine. Some will be less fine sooner, but all will be very unfine for a very long time.
Sounds like the government needs to realign its function.
Women should not expect to be able to stay at home while their husbands also have to support Julia.
I wonder how happy women are that their kid's money is being raided to support Julia? Oh, they probably don't think about it too much.
To those who say "get a husband who can support you," I point out that it used to be that people could own a home and support their families on middle class salaries. But, that was before government started taking everything over.
@Think Sorry I have to delete your responses to the other commenter that I always delete. In the future, please avoid responding to that commenter.
I prefer "Hedge Fund Manager" to "Stay At Home Mom" since my wife would run the household, the finances, the retirement planning and the human capital in the family.
If not that, Director of Operations would do.
Too bad the Commerce Department doesn't see it that way since it doesn't add anything they can quantify for GDP.
The problem with having a man (or woman) support you is that sometimes they leave, voluntarily or involuntarily. In a Great World, you'd have splendid life insurance for the latter eventuality (but that becomes more and more expensive given the current economic state), or a killer lawyer for the former eventuality.
It is prudent to have job skills that are current and marketable, regardless of your current employment status, and keeping up to date on something like that is a job in and of itself.
Ann, I guess the truth hurts, huh?
MaddisonMan:
I agree, that is a downside to having a stay at home spouse in the marriage. We sacrifice a large chunk of money every month for adequate life insurance. As for divorce, I don't know that there is an easy answer to that, other than not marrying the wrong person to begin with. But people change and that can't always be prevented. Even if a stay-at-home spouse was fully educated, she/he would have a hard time getting a good job after being out of the workforce for so many years.
@ Think, PaddyO and others. Mary is a prime example of the liberal progressive mind.
She thinks that life is a zero sum game. "A situation in which a gain by one person or side must be matched by a loss by another person or side".
If one person is making money that must mean that they are taking it away from another person.
If the husband is happy because he has a job and a wife who is staying at home, that must mean the wife's happiness has been taken away.
In stating that I have a husband who is taking care of me and loves me (which I certainly do) she and those like her with this mindset, miss the point. While he is taking care of me, providing for the home and bringing home money and wants me to be happy.....I am providing for him by making his life easier, comfortable, catering to his needs because I love him back and want him to be happy too.
Life and marriage is not a zero sum game where one person wins and the other person loses.
I feel very sorry for people who have this outlook because they are unhappy, jealous, bitter and think of themselves as being victimized.
Yeah Jay, it does. We can all smell the pain and fear racking your soul. They have pills for that now. As long as you are not still breeding, the generics should be fine.
We NEED better roads and infrastructures. No matter how cute your baby girl and stay at home wife they are now non-producers. Not contributing currently.
The economy, workers need roads before they need to give you a deduction incentive to breed a bigger support girlclub for you to enjoy.
LOL. I think Mary might be Obama or Elizabeth Warren. Or Mao, taking the place of the ghost writer who used to show up here from the 17th or 18th century. Get to work comrades. We need your taxes!
What about all of the stimulus money that was going to these shovel ready projects? When will enough money be enough?
I thought the stimulus moneys were part of Obama's re-election funds.
"I wonder how much of this is driven by kids like me, who grew up in daycare, and said no way are my kids going through that."
A sentiment whose wide and firm diffusion is devoutly to be wished.
DustBunny said:
When one person is happy in a relationship, it doesn't mean that they have stolen the other's happiness.
If more couples could learn this, I imagine we would have much less divorce. Society teaches the opposite. Unfortunately, I get the sense that many women are taught this more often than not, by parents, media, and the higher education system. It is almost impossible for them to fathom that both parties to a relationship can be happy, as shown by Mary.
Freeman Hunt,
The other thing, if you decide to stay home, is that you need to support your spouse like steel. You are a steel pillar of supportiveness that cannot be moved. That makes all the difference, I think.
I was going to blast this nonsense in my usual manner but, instead, I'll just say, Freeman, you're a great woman and the world needs more like you.
"I'm kind of an artist and a hippie."
True. More Flower Child - peace, love groovy - than hippie - hard drugs - I'd say. Fine photographer. Many of your nature and especially flower photos cycle through my desktop background. Thanks.
Wish you could stop the fires in WA. Millions of animals roasting. Rain dance, please, with hippie or Flower Child beads. Seriously!
My wife and I suck at finances.
We need to get better ... big time.
Allie wrote: I think I look more like OOOla, you inspired me to look her up, so in your honor I will change my moniker to OOOla.
You only go around once in life--grab for all the goatse you can.
If you want to stay home with the kids, just babysit other peoples' kids. Do it for free. Use your vacation time to do it for weeks and weeks. A little of that will cure your ass of that idea, and then you can go on to be a powerful woman of note - a competitor - a real vicious animal, free of constraints. The American dream.
OOOla
Yes you do look like Alley's long-suffering girlfriend and there is absolutely nothing wrong with that! {Stalker Alert}
As far as Mary goes, I got it now. Damn dyslexia. The point stands, you will find *special* people everywhere. It's not a politics thing.
"The other thing, if you decide to stay home, is that you need to support your spouse like steel. You are a steel pillar of supportiveness that cannot be moved. That makes all the difference, I think."
Noble, brave, rewarding...risky.
This is incredibly difficult today. The amount of trust in your spouse this would take is enormous. A wise man, would never let that get away, and wise men are rare.
Imagine, Bill Clinton is considered wise by many people.
Bag-O
Clinton was a lying cad to Hillary, but they have both stuck together for a long time. For better or worse, etc. Pretty conservative family values. As far as his cheating, would Jesus be throwing stones at him?
oola:
Love the new avatar. She is the original modern woman in comics.
It's all because of you Howard.
Childless people do not subsidize people with children. Who makes Social Security and Medicare happen? (Answer: The next generation.) Who do you hire for various services, such as medical care, when you are old? (Answer: The children of your peers.)
Imagine a world without children. Then do the accounting of cost.
"The other thing, if you decide to stay home, is that you need to support your spouse like steel. You are a steel pillar of supportiveness that cannot be moved. That makes all the difference, I think."
I really like this Freeman - well said.
"Noble, brave, rewarding...risky.
This is incredibly difficult today. The amount of trust in your spouse this would take is enormous. A wise man, would never let that get away, and wise men are rare."
I'm a lawyer by training who quit when my son was born 4 yrs ago. Although I've maintained my licenses, I realize that if my husband ever leaves me, I am financially screwed. I have to trust I married one of the good ones. But then again, I don't understand women who marry anyone in whom they can't place this kind of trust.
Imagine a world without children. Then do the accounting of cost.
Anger/resentment towards "breeders" has been the only common trait I've been able to see regarding the angry irrationals inhabiting this blog. There really is no other marker including gender,
, political flavor, sexual orientation, race, etc.
"Pick your spouse carefully." That's like saying don't feed the bears. Tell that to the grizzlies....I suppose you can maximize the odds. Women shoudn't be pen pals to men in prison. Men should not pair off with women with too many overwritten tats. Common sense precautions, but you can still end up with a clunker. Marriage is an essentially irrational act, and what's surprising is how many work out.
See what I mean?
"Childless people do not subsidize people with children."
In Europe now there are so few people having children that the governments of a couple of countries are doing everything they can to practically *pay* people to have children.
We can certainly disagree and discuss when or if ever taxes should be used to create social incentives, but as far as "things we want other people to do" goes, having kids should be at the top of the list.
Sure there are still some people who will believe with all their heart that Malthus was right no matter how many cultures and societies slide toward voluntary extinction, but Malthus wasn't right and every childless person depends on breeders for the future.
Meanwhile governments other than ours are begging their citizens to *please* have kids and trying to figure out ways to bribe them to do that.
Me? I don't want money and I don't really care if there aren't tax incentives since I don't believe that taxes are ever properly used for social management, but I do wish that people wouldn't seem to try so very hard to make our "public" areas so inappropriate for children and then blame parents for not being good enough at raising them.
Sure lady. We pay the hospital bills, the WIC nutrition bills, breakfast lunch and din-din along with the public education bills, and before that the daycare writeoffs.... but your little pumpkin is one day gonna be called on to support single old, working and saving, independent old me.
That, I can agree with. I'm only taking issue with the idea that the tax deductions aren't likely a net gain for the childless.
I'm also not arguing that every child is a net gain for the economy. The ones who turn out well (more likely if raised well) are. Children who turn into criminals or social safety net scammers are a loss. (Not commenting on intrinsic worth of persons here, strictly economic.)
Let us all have the choice to opt out of Social Security already.
Here, surely, we can all agree! Take those other tax deductions away too if we're going to do that.
You pay your money and take your chances. Us breeders are subsidized by the pathologically self-involved childless narcissists who would otherwise go on more vacations to Aruba or afford a better class of nursing home.
It's a known fact that the non-breeding libertarian purists will dutifully refuse medicare and social security out of principle because they know it's a Ponzi scheme. It would be hypocritical to be subsidized by the tax-paying children of breeders.
Just look at their hero, Ayn Rand. She never received any help from the government nor from taxes paid by the children of breeders. When her time came, she refused all moocher medical help, took a walk in the forest and was devoured by Gaia, leaving no trace.
Of course, if people had to rely on their OWN children for their old age instead of having government take other people's money for those oldsters who either didn't have kids or were so horrible to them that the kids don't care if Mom starves alone and unloved, well that would be a different story.
There wouldn't be any confusion over who was subsidizing who.
My wife and I married when we were both in the Air Force. After her first tour she left and became a stay at home mom. Our three sons are better for it.
Howard! So true, Ayn Rand died on the dole.
Lol.
Don't drink.
Don't hate men.
Not abused.
That's a relief
... then what is your excuse?
Ayn Rand also supported her house husband, cheated on him and wrote often of her love of violent sex. A brilliant self promoter and a great immigrant story, no doubt. I loved The Fountainhead in my 20's and much of it is true. However, with any strident authoritative popular personality based philosophy, the big ideas grew small and the battles, petty.
Libertarianism is like a beautiful hothouse flower. It looks perfect, but can't survive in the real world.
Us breeders are subsidized by the pathologically self-involved childless narcissists
I'm going to say that the underlying premise in that kind of statement is that life should somehow be "fair".
Government affords a choice to everyone -- have a kid, get a kickback. People who whine are those who decide choice one or choice two and then complain about the unfairness of it all.
I don't poof anymore, I'm way too old, I just have a few Mount Gay rums, smooth and delicious.
I wonder how happy women are that their kid's money is being raided to support Julia? Oh, they probably don't think about it too much.
Oh, but some of us do indeed think about it. You should have heard me blow my stack to my husband about my SAHM friend's post on Facebook--posted via her iPad--asking which doctors in town accept Medicaid.
We can't afford an iPad, and we can't afford for me to stay home full time, but by golly we're paying taxes so that others can.
Never wanted kids, so never had a dog in this fight. But have worked for, and with, many professional moms (engineers, attorneys). The constant stench of sheer exhaustion that wafted off them would, I would think, discourage all but the most ambitious. They always seemed a hairsbreadth away from passing out, or freaking out. I always wanted to shake them by the shoulders and yell at them to just go home and get some sleep! And they would bitch about how their husbands were exhausted as well.
I never saw the point of having BOTH parents drained and burnt out by work all the time - what kind of family life is that? Why not have someone at home 'holding the center' as it were...serving as the calm in the middle of the storm?
The good thing about socialism is that it wouldn't take 80 hour work weeks to bust through the glass ceiling.
True, but only because you won't have a job at all.
In 1983, when I last got engaged, I was dating two women. I could have been happy married to either one. One was a 28 yr old nurse who had never had children and the other was a 36 yr old—my age—MD who had two children and did not want more. I was still paying child support for two sons from my first marriage. I proposed to the Doctor. I figured the nurse would, as soon as we got married, get pregnant and quit her job, leaving me on the hook for everything. She was very pretty but I think I made the right decision. I have been married to the Doctor for 27 years now.
Ken in Sc,
You might have made the right choice, but I picked up the younger one a few days after you dumped her, and have been with her ever since. She talks about you every damned day. Just let me know, and I'll hook you up. Please, be a mensch! I'll make it up to you.
I agree with Penelope Trunk. Figure this out before you get married.
I have experience being the stay at home parent. For men, I recommend that you don't. It's really hard, but not for the reasons you'd think. Taking care of small children is emotionally taxing, but men are very good at overcoming challenges. That's what men do all the time.
What's hard is the loss of respect from almost everyone, especially women. Especially women.
Women do not want men taking care of children. They don't, I don't care what they say, but they don't. Why don't men work in day cares? How many male kindergarten teachers do you know? I think my entire school district has one.
I lost a lot from taking care of my son. I had to, it was the only way we could make it financially, but the material and spiritual price was very high. I lost friends and half my family disowned me. Now that I'm working everyone thinks I'm great. It's bullshit, but that's life.
Men and women are not treated the same. Women, in particular, are enormous hypocrites when it comes to taking care of children. My wife understood, she was here with me, but no one else did. And that matters.
Plus, I get to experience the mommy track. I'm starting all over again in my late 30s. It's expensive.
If you are upper or upper middle class, and if you live in a progressive area, and your wife makes a lot, then I guess you can try it. Otherwise, don't. Get a second job, work 50 hours a week, do whatever you can do financially. It's easier and you're more likely to stay married.
Hey, Bago20, that was an amusing comment you made after my comment about the pretty nurse. I hope you are happy with her even though she mentions me every day. BTW, I also figured that after she had children, she would forget about me, get fat, cut me off in the bedroom, and that would lead me to get a girlfriend. Then she would divorce me and put me in economic chains for the next 15 to 18 years. I did not want to go through that again.
My doctor wife eventually, but not at first, makes more money than I do. Therefore, she has no monetary incentives to screw me over in divorce court. I have made it a point to give her no other incentives. Things are fine in the bedroom as well.
All Mary's comments are deleted unread. If you see any, it only means they haven't been deleted yet. If you respond to her, your comment will have to go down too.
I don't like having to repeat this, but newcomers like Think need to learn this.
--To only slightly change the topic - this is where gay marriage matters. Because we're not married, and yet I stay home and therefore have no income, I also have rapidly diminishing credit. I doubt I'd even be able to buy a car on my own now. God forbid we ever split (been together over 13 years so far) I'd be in a world of hurt that most straight women wouldn't be--
Not necessarily if the new banking regs I read a blurb about are true - if you're a SAHM, you can't get a Credit Card under hubby's name any more.
"What did you DO all day?"
"You mean, BESIDES sit in a cubicle looking forward to lunch?"
Q-What do you do all day?
A-Anything I want.
The other thing, if you decide to stay home, is that you need to support your spouse like steel. You are a steel pillar of supportiveness that cannot be moved. That makes all the difference, I think.
Progressives viewing this relationship from the outside would conclude that the stay-at-home is a mere dishrag for doing this. This is thanks to the spiritual etiolation wrought by years of proclaiming that "the personal is political".
Hanna Rosin wept.
My spouse and I have 4 kids and she is a stay at home mom. My wife keeps up with the kids (and I help quite a bit), and volunteers for two community groups that work with young kids. Because we have the work divied out, I am able to also volunteer for yet another community group that works specifically with young boys. The amount of happiness and fulfillment we receive being able to raise 4 kids and at the same time be a vital part of our community cannot be measured. I highly recommend it to anyone. It may cause the money situation to be a little bit tight, but you will find yourself abundant with joy. Much better than living in a big two story box of a house that you wish you didn't have to maintain and always feeling like life is passing you by.
It has been a pleasure to read the commentary here. I live in a college town where the tenure track professors often have included in their contracts a position for their spouse (usually the wife) that their department pays a portion of. A good friend of mine with kids in the elementary school recently landed one of those dream jobs - $22/hour, 20 hours/week with a state pension. She says she has to work because her husband, making over $120K/year, says they can't make it on his income, even in upstate NY.
This says a lot about people and their attitude towards money. She says she wants to stay home, though I suspect not really, but she can't figure out how to cut costs. Since my husband brings in less than half and we are doing our best despite the ghastly gas and food prices, I laughed when she told me this.
That's kind of terrible to laugh, but I did use the being on the same team analogy with her when explaining why we're doing what we're doing. Being at home with my kids is an absolute gift and I let my husband know I feel that way every single day.
Author John Ross, wrote a number of columns a while back, one of which addressed this very issue:
http://web.archive.org/web/20070108014754/http://www.john-ross.net/feminism.htm
Here's an excerpt:
"Which of the career paths listed below makes more sense?:
1. Focus on career right out of school, have recreational sex with pleasant male companions your own age, be on the success track for 10-15 years, then panic when you realize you want children but you don't want to derail your career, your looks are starting to fade compared to the twentysomethings, there aren't any men that seem interested in marrying you, and in any event, you're running out of time,
or
2. After high school or during college, focus on finding a man about 10 years older who has established himself in the last decade and who wants a family. Use your youth, looks, and fertility to find the best possible man for the role of Husband and Father. Have children at a young age, soon after you finish your schooling, while you have lots of energy and your body will recover quickly. Be there for the kids when they need you, and let your husband do the financial lifting. Be good to both the kids and your husband, and be thinking about what your career dreams are while caring for your family. Talk to your husband about these dreams. Tell him you don't want to just sit around the house at age 40-45. Then go after your dream, once the kids are of majority age. You've still got a few good decades left, plenty of time for career success."
There's lots more provocative suggestions in the essay and definitely food for thought.
I am very thankful that I have been able to be a stay home wife and mom for 24 years and we live quite well off a very modest income. It can be done, it is worth it and most definitely we should respect our spouses as well as our children.
"She can't understand why he passes on socializing with her friends."
If someone snubbed my husband for any reason, he or she would be out of my life so fast there'd be a popping vacuum in the room.
Big WARNING to Dads on this one. Although it is great to have Mom or Dad stay at home with the kids, when the divorce comes 15 years down the line, whoever is working will be guilty and have to pay.
My first wife stayed home with the kids despite my insistence that she should continue working. After seeing that it was great for the kids, each year she had the option of staying home or going to work. She chose to stay home.
Then many years later, she decided she wanted a divorce, and of course I was responsible for her ruined career. She also claimed she was too old to establish a career now. Not only did I have to give her half of everything (including my retirement), she gets half of my net pay for many years now.
I have nothing left and somehow have to manage to get the kids through college on top of it all.
I would never let a woman stay at home to care for the kids again. They are simply going to have to work.
One salary was never enough, but hay-- it is worth it for the kids right? All while Mom was staying home, it was depressing to go places and always see couples doing far better and having far better homes than we did. Now that single salary which barely paid for everyone living under one roof is split between two roofs and college. Retirement will never happen, and my half-dead smoldering financial carcass is laying by the roadside.
Yeah, with Mom staying at home, we lived below our means, and now after the divorce, we live far below our means. Great plan, and it worked out really well. Instead of the kids looking back and being glad that one parent stayed home, they now just resent us for the divorce.
Stay at home Moms and no-fault divorce is prescription for financial disaster down the road.
Etendue -- when you say "living below your means," I get the idea that you're referring to something more like "living below your sense of where you'd like to be in life." The commenters here are talking about adjusting expenses downward so that there's money left over in each paycheck cycle for savings and emergency funds, instead of spending whatever is necessary to live a life like that of one's dual-income colleagues or neighbors.
It's true that divorce will put a huge strain on any savings or retirement planning. It's always going to be more expensive to support two households. I have to say that, if I were to be a SAHM, I'd want savings socked away in my own name. The last thing you'd want is to have to sue your soon-to-be-ex for some share of what he always thought of as "his" money, while you were assuming that it was "family" money.
The commenters above who talked about being in this together really nailed it.
Hi Texan99,
I understand exactly what was being said previously here. I just needed the person who is potentially the one assigned to make the money to beware of what potential pitfalls lie ahead if the wife decides it's not a family thing many years down the road.
As for living below my means, you should see where and how we lived before you "assume" what I am saying.
It's hard to sock away money when the person not working chronically spends 500-1200/month on credit cards and refuses to stop.
Look, as people have said above, you need to know your partner, but the person you knew may not be there 15 years later.
Meade and Ann are loafs leaching off the taxpayers if Wisconsin.
I'm sorry if I misunderstood you, etendue. I thought you said you lived below your means before the divorce and were doing so even more now after the divorce. But at the same time you seemed to be describing a situation in which there was some kind of chronic fiscal deficit (i.e., the credit-card over-spending problem).
So I thought you must be using the phrase in an unfamiliar way.
Texan99,
Just in case you didn't know, unless there is a realy good prenup and all finances were disclosed ahead of time, there is no such thing as "socked away savings in [your] own name" if you are married. Nothing will get you hit with contempt of court faster than trying to hide financial resources in the midst of a divorce's property settlement. Most family courts don't care a wit how property is titled.
All,
I'm late to this party, but one aspect I haven't seen addressed well, was that life, and especially work and income, are not static or monotonically increasing anymore.
Those decisions made jointly years ago about someone staying home from work don't hold up really well if the work-for-$ partner has a career that craters. Talk about resentment! The stay-at-home mom feels like you've breached the contract, and regardless of circumstances, she'll never really accept that it wasn't your fault.
So tread carefully down this road. What you can afford now may not be what you can afford in the future.
ruralcounsel:
IAAL, so I guess I'm fairly up to speed on the techniques. Of course it depends on the state. In Texas, it's a matter of declaring it separate property (by gift if necessary) and being consistent about it, using a trust if necessary to maintain its unambiguously separate status.
But my husband (now of almost 30 years) and I never had to worry about it. This is a community property state, where it's obvious from the start that everything is 50/50 unless you take some care to make it otherwise. We worked all that out early on, so that it wouldn't be a dark undercurrent in every spat over the years. Marital power struggles are hard enough without adding the financial complication.
"More of the moocher mentality. I fear for where this country is going. Obama proudly campaigns as the pro-moocher President and he's winning handily."
you are all a bunch of pathetic god diggers, manipulating the system so that you won't have to get a job.Thata the whole idea isn't it? It has nothing to do with whats best for your child and everything to do with your lazy, selfish mooching A!@#$es. So basically, the plan is, get married, have a meal ticket as soon as humanly possible and there's your sorry, goldigging excuse for mooching off someone elses back. you are all very very patheitc and I'm ashamed to be a woman because of people like you.I feel even worse for your clueless wallets..ummm husbands, who are really nothing more than a ticket to the gravy train.
"More of the moocher mentality. I fear for where this country is going. Obama proudly campaigns as the pro-moocher President and he's winning handily."
you are all a bunch of pathetic god diggers, manipulating the system so that you won't have to get a job.Thata the whole idea isn't it? It has nothing to do with whats best for your child and everything to do with your lazy, selfish mooching A!@#$es. So basically, the plan is, get married, have a meal ticket as soon as humanly possible and there's your sorry, goldigging excuse for mooching off someone elses back. you are all very very patheitc and I'm ashamed to be a woman because of people like you.I feel even worse for your clueless wallets..ummm husbands, who are really nothing more than a ticket to the gravy train.
I am a stay at home mom, I have teacher's college etc. I do feel lucky that I am able to stay home. I think it is best for our two kids, it is easier on my husband to go to work everyday and know that I am at home, he gets dinner made, laundry done and knows the kids are in good hands. It is a team effort. But, I have education and we both know it is not forever and I will work. I want my kids to also be proud of me and have someone to model after. When that day comes, my husband knows he will have to clean washrooms, take turns cooking and take turns doing laundry and cleaning.
I am a stay at home mom, I have teacher's college etc. I do feel lucky that I am able to stay home. I think it is best for our two kids, it is easier on my husband to go to work everyday and know that I am at home, he gets dinner made, laundry done and knows the kids are in good hands. It is a team effort. But, I have education and we both know it is not forever and I will work. I want my kids to also be proud of me and have someone to model after. When that day comes, my husband knows he will have to clean washrooms, take turns cooking and take turns doing laundry and cleaning.
I have an education. I am a teacher. Currently, I am a stay at home mom. It is easier than to be a working mom on my husband and my kids. My kids get taken care of, my husband can work with little worry about the kids and he knows he shirts will be cleaned, dinner will be made and all he has to do is work. When I do work eventually, my husband knows he will have to clean bathrooms, do laundry and cook and we need to take turns and on top of it take turns taking kids to lessons and doing daddy and me and mommy and me time.
the truth hurts doesnt it?
HELLO to my friends out there i am testifying about the good work of a man who help me it has been hell from the day my husband left me i am a woman with two kids my problem stated when the father of my kids travel i never help he was living but as at two weeks i did not set my eye on my husband i try calling but he was not taken my call some week he call me telling me that he has found love some where easy at first i never take to be serous but day after he came to the house to pick his things that was the time i notice that things is going bad i help he will come back but things was going bad day by day i needed to talk to someone about it so i went to his friend but there was no help so i give it up on him month later i met on the the internet a spell caster i never believe on this but i needed my men back so i gave the spell caster my problem at first i never trusted him so i was just doing it for doing sake but after three day my husband called me telling me that he his coming home i still do not believe but as at the six day the father to my kids came to the house asking me to for give him the spell work to said to my self from that day i was happy with my family thanks to the esango priest of (abamieghe)esango priest he his a great man you need to try him you can as well to tell him your problem so that he can be of help to you his content email is this esangopriest@gmail.com indeed you are a priest thank you for making my home a happy home again. remember his email is esangopriest@gmail.com
I am educated, love what i do, have had a successful 20+ years in my chosen field, and I can say with absolute certainty, that the biggest heartache of my life was not being in a position (or not having a spouse that supported it) to be a stay-at-home mom.
I URGE all young men who are planning families to do whatever they can to assure that they do WHATEVER they can to encourage and empower their wives to be at home with your children if their hearts tell them to do so. SACRIFICE whatever you have to to make this happen for your children, for your family, for your life partner. I promise, you will never EVER regret it. You will be seen and regarded as NOBLE, VALIANT, AND LOVING and through it, your children will have an abundance of love and respect for you and will be better equipped to make a difference in this world as adults. Beautiful LEGACIES have been born from such bold and pointed decisions and efforts.
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