Is giving up making your own money a bad idea for ANY woman? (philosophical ponderings)

[Anonymous]

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Anonymous wrote:It's not worth the time to consider because you can't extrapolate out from individual couples. In other words, it's all micro, no macro. I'm sorry your husband had mental problems and you got divorced but that has nothing to do with me. Every marriage is different and no one knows what goes on inside a marriage except the two people in it.

How wonderful to have 1000% certainty that nothing bad will ever befall you.

I agree with PP. My parents are together, reasonably happily, as are DH's parents. While either DH or I could lose our health or our jobs, I don't foresee divorce in our future. Our kids are young, we're still paying off debt and living paycheck-to-paycheck (yes, I 'm working part-time because we can't afford for me to SAHM, we tried it). When we're more financially secure, then we'll make better plans for future disasters.

I don't see divorce in my future either, but what about an extreme illness or accident leading my husband to be out of work for a very long period of time?

Np. You can buy insurance for this.

You can get term life insurance. But insurance to pay if your husband can't work? How long is that good for? You need like a $1M policy b/c u have non income and likely care and medical costs.

You buy long-term disability coverage, which will replace a % of income. That can last for the number of years provided in the policy, and some will provide that it can last until the person reaches retirement age.

That's if he is long-term disabled. What if we're just talking garden variety severe economic downturn and loss of job/income for months or years? I mean, there's a lot that can happen.

Well, hopefully people who have made the choice to have one person stay home built up their savings enough before they did so to cover at least six months or so of expenses. Beyond that, if the working spouse doesn't find a job right away, both start looking for jobs and they reassess from there based on what either of them fine.

We can play out the parade of horribles until everyone is out on the street no matter what their situation -- no one is totally immune. After all, what if both working spouses lose their jobs in the downturn (as happened to more than one couple I know in the most recent recession)? The reality is that for most people, it's a matter of balancing needs, preferences and risk tolerance. There are no guarantees (says the previous poster with the child with severe developmental delays who definitely never expected that to be in the cards).

[Anonymous]

I once read that the only statistically significant difference in outcome for children who have working mothers versus SAHMs is a higher likelihood for daughters to follow their mothers' paths. I can live with that. I would hope my daughter has a career and is self supporting and I am sure that my SAHM friends would prefer for their children to do the same.

In order to feel good about myself, I want to use my education and training (specific to me - I appreciate that others are different). I also want to model for my children a marriage where many roles are jointly held rather than being one of the spouses's primary responsibility (a joint goal for our family - again I understand that others might want to model different paths to a strong marriage). I want my children to see the give and take of a household where we both financially contribute and we both negotiate other responsibilities. As an example, during the recent school closings in ffx county, my kids watched us decide who would stay home, how to come up with options to cover childcare and how to prioritize as a couple which of our out of the house commitments was most pressing.

I hope to teach my daughter that compatibility with your spouse on how you want your marriage to unfold is super important. I married a man who wanted a wife with her own career. When he was young, his father lost his job and his untrained sah mother had to try to find a job in retail to make ends meet. I dont think it lasted a long time but for some reason, it made a huge impression on DH. He told me that he did not want the stress of being the only breadwinner and that in order to facilitate that, he was willing to share equally in the day to day household and childcare responsibilities. I worked part time for five years when my children were very young, and DH was very supportive. But I think we both wanted for me to go back full time. It is working out for us. He outearns me, but I think we both feel that we could weather a job loss (his or mine) ok.

I don't spend a lot of time thinking about divorce and even without the spectre of divorce (or death or whatever), I want to work. I hope my daughter (and son) choose to work for its own rewards and not just for insurance purposes. But of course, they are going to do what they want to do and I will support whatever choices they make...

[Anonymous]

I wouldn't assume that all mothers can get rewarding, well paid work but some just choose not to. There are many of us out of the workforce because of straight up failures and bad luck. Take someone who majored in something less than practical, moved to an area for the husband's job with few local opportunities for them, and then add in a husband with a lot of travel and no flexibility. That is where a lot of SAHMs come from. If your earning potential is not that high, sometimes it really does not pay for you to take a retail or admin job for the sake of some hypothetical future career investment.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:What you need to do, OP, and what every woman needs to do, is support rational maternity leave policies like those in literally EVERY OTHER developed country. Canada, for example, gives women 52 paid weeks of maternity leave. A woman there doesn't need to choose between work and SAH, she can be there for the first, crucial year and return to work. I know I would have been SO much more likely to be on-track career wise if I had a full year to learn about being a mom and raise my baby/nurse/make it through PPD than here with our backwards, shitty policies that are very anti-family and pro-corporation.

This!

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I once read that the only statistically significant difference in outcome for children who have working mothers versus SAHMs is a higher likelihood for daughters to follow their mothers' paths. I can live with that. I would hope my daughter has a career and is self supporting and I am sure that my SAHM friends would prefer for their children to do the same.

In order to feel good about myself, I want to use my education and training (specific to me - I appreciate that others are different). I also want to model for my children a marriage where many roles are jointly held rather than being one of the spouses's primary responsibility (a joint goal for our family - again I understand that others might want to model different paths to a strong marriage). I want my children to see the give and take of a household where we both financially contribute and we both negotiate other responsibilities. As an example, during the recent school closings in ffx county, my kids watched us decide who would stay home, how to come up with options to cover childcare and how to prioritize as a couple which of our out of the house commitments was most pressing.

I hope to teach my daughter that compatibility with your spouse on how you want your marriage to unfold is super important. I married a man who wanted a wife with her own career. When he was young, his father lost his job and his untrained sah mother had to try to find a job in retail to make ends meet. I dont think it lasted a long time but for some reason, it made a huge impression on DH. He told me that he did not want the stress of being the only breadwinner and that in order to facilitate that, he was willing to share equally in the day to day household and childcare responsibilities. I worked part time for five years when my children were very young, and DH was very supportive. But I think we both wanted for me to go back full time. It is working out for us. He outearns me, but I think we both feel that we could weather a job loss (his or mine) ok.

I don't spend a lot of time thinking about divorce and even without the spectre of divorce (or death or whatever), I want to work. I hope my daughter (and son) choose to work for its own rewards and not just for insurance purposes. But of course, they are going to do what they want to do and I will support whatever choices they make...

Your relationship with your spouse sounds incredible. A true partnership. This is the best role modeling you can do for your kids. You did good