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Men, Women, and Money
Today on Babble:
Men, Women, and Money: If Mom Earns More Than Dad, Who Changes the Diapers?
Writes Nell Casey:
Last year, I made more money than my husband did. The difference wasn’t enormous — only 20% — but it was meaningful….When I cut my work days short for school pick up, or when I loped down the aisles of Target trying to find a pair of elusive “water shoes” or when I simply called the pediatrician, I would sometimes find myself thinking, Have I not bought my way out of this? How can I make a full-time salary and attend to its full-time pressures if so much of my day is stolen away by the responsibilities of parenting?
In today’s world of two-income families, the idea of Dad as breadwinner and Mom as homemaker is becoming increasingly more rare. But as the balance of incomes shift, traditional roles are slower to change. For whatever reason, breadwinning moms still find themselves in the role as primary caregiver.
Read the entire essay here, then come back and share your thoughts with us. Should salary dictate who’s in charge of the kids? Does the one with the highest income/most stressful job get a “pass” on family duties? And what is the secret of a truly balanced marriage?
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3 Comments
[...] Bethany Sanders wrote about Nell Casey’s article wherein she explained that she earns more than her husband and [...]
Men, Women, and Money - A Man’s View | Strollerderby commented on Jan 15 10 at 11:01 amPlumbLucky commented on Jan 14 10 at 12:33 pmI guess that the fact that neither my husband nor I come from “traditional Cleaver families” where Dad is the breadwinner and Mom is the homemaker (neither of our families have homemakers in them, unless you go back to the point of farming/farmer’s wife, and I daresay that’s not “homemaking”), but we have a decent balance that works for us. Neither of us is really “the breadwinner”, and neither of us gets a free pass on parenting.
Angela commented on Jan 14 10 at 5:31 pmNo, salary shouldn’t even figure into the division of household labor IMO. What if one parent has a really high paying job and earns more money working part-time than the other who works full-time? Would it really be fair to expect the full-time worker to take on more chores and parenting responsibilities because he/she earns less. At the same time though I definitely don’t feel that everything should automatically fall to the woman either. My husband does work more hours at his job than I do so when I’m home and he’s not I obviously need to take care of things at home on my own. On weekends though when we’re both home we make a list of everything that needs to get done in priority order and then divide it up. That works for us but I think each couple has to find their own system of making things fair.
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