NYT: Forget Pancakes. Pay Mothers.

[Anonymous]

One lesson from the pandemic: Child care is work. And it should be compensated.

After just six days of sheltering in place, I found myself thinking about all the women I’d taken for granted.

I started with Griselda, who cared for my kids when they were babies, a few hours each week. I thought about Beth and Perrine, and every babysitter and cleaning lady I’d ever used — all the women I’d paid to come into my home over the past 13 years so that I could leave it and do other things.

If someone had asked me why I paid these women to do things that I could do myself — particularly when I made so little money with the time they freed up — I’d say that I did it because I wanted to work, because I needed to work, not just out of economic necessity but also out of a need to feel like a full human being. The implication here was that when I did the child care and housework and cooking and laundry, it was not work but something else.

Now, for the first time, everyone is doing the work we don’t call work when women do it. We watch Jimmy Fallon play with his daughters while filming “The Tonight Show” and think, “Maybe it’s work, after all.”

In 1972, and in some ways even more so in 2012, the idea of wages for housework seemed radical to most Americans, and counterproductive to many feminists. The liberal-feminist agenda of the past 40 years has been focused on helping women escape domestic burdens and gain reproductive freedom so they can achieve financial autonomy and accumulate power. I have always believed in this project. But on my seventh day of lockdown, I began to wonder if this was exactly where I, and many other white, middle-class feminists, have gone wrong.

Equality will not come from privileged women foisting their exploitation onto other women. Instead women have to say, collectively, “From now on, they have to pay us, because as women we do not guarantee anything any longer.”

In other words, if garbage collectors and grocery store workers and hedge fund managers expect to be paid for their labor, why not those who create and sustain the human race? Why can’t we imagine some form of universal basic caretakers income to support the work mothers (or fathers or other extended kin) do at home?


https://www.nytimes.com/2020/05/08/opinion/sunday/women-housework-coronavirus-mothers-day.html?action=click&module=Opinion&pgtype=Homepage

[Anonymous]

You are free to pay whatever you want.

[Anonymous]

Great article. I've been watching Mrs. America on Hulu lately so the bolded part about feminists in 1972 is particularly interesting to me.

These women were so short sighted! They did want to exclude "housewives" i.e. SAHMs from the movement. But what did they expect to happen? That people would stop having children? Who did they expect to raise these children? Did they expect those people to be paid a "living wage"? That part is never covered in these conversations.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:You are free to pay whatever you want.

yeah and most people try to get away with paying as little as possible by hiring undocumented immigrants.

[Anonymous]

The feminist movement has always been driven by MC and UMC women (mainly white women). You're just now figuring this out? Get the hell out of your bubble.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:You are free to pay whatever you want.

yeah and most people try to get away with paying as little as possible by hiring undocumented immigrants.

This or paying them "off the books" so they don't have to pay taxes as their employer (contributing to their social security).

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:The feminist movement has always been driven by MC and UMC women (mainly white women). You're just now figuring this out? Get the hell out of your bubble.

Duh. But the point is that nothing has changed. The conversation is still dominated by UMC women.

"I work to use my brain." "I work to feel like a person." Ok and? The people (women) raising your children and cleaning your home don't deserve to feel that way?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:You are free to pay whatever you want.

+1

[Anonymous]

That approach won’t work.

But a significantly increased tax credit or stipend per young child (0-5) based on need beyond the poverty level might work.

Of course, it might also create a perverse incentive to have more babies. A possible solution might be a cap on benefits.

The reality is most sahms don’t need to be paid. Heck, many have hired help.

[Anonymous]

I am conflicted about a payment specifically for housework and child care to women. It’s great as an idea but implementing it is not easy. Some countries provide monetary support per child, other countries subsidize maternity leaves for parents. Economists are toying with the idea of universal income. To me these would be more palatable than paying women for housework. On one hand it returns housework back squarely to women as a duty and responsibility: “You get paid to cook and wipe butts”, on the other, how amounts be decided for women who stay at home vs those who work and still do a big chunk of housework and childcare, and 2 parent households who both work, what about grandparents and others? What about stay at home childless spouses? Do they also get paid something? I think it’s more straightforward to either provide support per child or just go for the universal income.

[Anonymous]

Plus, who is the employer? I think of staying home as paying myself for caregiving. I’m the employer. That’s why I’m paying for the labor, by forgoing my salary.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:That approach won’t work.

But a significantly increased tax credit or stipend per young child (0-5) based on need beyond the poverty level might work.

Of course, it might also create a perverse incentive to have more babies. A possible solution might be a cap on benefits.

The reality is most sahms don’t need to be paid. Heck, many have hired help.

So why not look at models in every other developed country? It's not about paying women to clean their own houses; it's about providing support to families based on the belief that caring for children and family, especially in the very early years, is important to society and that work has value. This support could be needs-based or use some other cap since, this is the United States after all, and we would apparently rather everyone suffer than accept the idea that a small percentage of people might "take advantage" of the system.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:You are free to pay whatever you want.

yeah and most people try to get away with paying as little as possible by hiring undocumented immigrants.

This or paying them "off the books" so they don't have to pay taxes as their employer (contributing to their social security).

A lot of people who are looking for childcare jobs prefer to be paid "off the books".

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:That approach won’t work.

But a significantly increased tax credit or stipend per young child (0-5) based on need beyond the poverty level might work.

Of course, it might also create a perverse incentive to have more babies. A possible solution might be a cap on benefits.

The reality is most sahms don’t need to be paid. Heck, many have hired help.

So why not look at models in every other developed country? It's not about paying women to clean their own houses; it's about providing support to families based on the belief that caring for children and family, especially in the very early years, is important to society and that work has value. This support could be needs-based or use some other cap since, this is the United States after all, and we would apparently rather everyone suffer than accept the idea that a small percentage of people might "take advantage" of the system.

Um, pretty sure that’s what I suggested. See tax credit or stipend above for young kids 0-5.

[Anonymous]

At the very least, we should bring alimony back.

Alimony is a feminist issue imo. If we believe women are equals and empower them to make choices, then we need to make sure they don't suffer the consequences of them.