Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I grew up around mostly single moms. They all worked FT and some had second jobs. It's just what they did. My mom worked FT and had around an hour commute. She did this for 40ish or so years. Everyone did.

I think parents these days are so tired because their kids have way too many activities. Stop signing your kids up for all of that. You're bringing this on yourself.

It’s an arms race. If you isn’t doing soccer travel at age 6, they won’t make high school or best club teams and won’t be recruited to best colleges etc, and their third tier college prospects will mean underemployment forever.

Yes single mothers worked, but a huge percentage of them lived with their own parents or roped in other family to help — they generally were flexible enough as a single adult household to move closer to family.

Or just left the kids to fend for themselves and lived on squalor. How exactly were they getting kids to school, working and commuting, making dinner, doing all chores etc? Something had to give.

That’s BS. My DS was raised by me, single mom. He played soccer for a few years and then did one EC in HS that met once a month. He graduated from college a few weeks ago and has a job starting in June. He didn’t fend for himself, he didn’t live in squalor. He has his own car, a Roth IRA from savings from summer jobs. He took the bus to/from school, had daily and weekly chores. He watched YouTube videos to learn how to cook when I wasn’t home. He made dinner on the nights I worked late.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I grew up around mostly single moms. They all worked FT and some had second jobs. It's just what they did. My mom worked FT and had around an hour commute. She did this for 40ish or so years. Everyone did.

I think parents these days are so tired because their kids have way too many activities. Stop signing your kids up for all of that. You're bringing this on yourself.

It’s an arms race. If you isn’t doing soccer travel at age 6, they won’t make high school or best club teams and won’t be recruited to best colleges etc, and their third tier college prospects will mean underemployment forever.

Yes single mothers worked, but a huge percentage of them lived with their own parents or roped in other family to help — they generally were flexible enough as a single adult household to move closer to family.

Or just left the kids to fend for themselves and lived on squalor. How exactly were they getting kids to school, working and commuting, making dinner, doing all chores etc? Something had to give.

That’s BS. My DS was raised by me, single mom. He played soccer for a few years and then did one EC in HS that met once a month. He graduated from college a few weeks ago and has a job starting in June. He didn’t fend for himself, he didn’t live in squalor. He has his own car, a Roth IRA from savings from summer jobs. He took the bus to/from school, had daily and weekly chores. He watched YouTube videos to learn how to cook when I wasn’t home. He made dinner on the nights I worked late.

Anonymous wrote: Try being one parent who works two jobs and holds it all down solo. That is real fatigue. I would kill to have just one job or to have a second parent and income in our household. You’ve got both. Please realize how lucky you are!

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:How did the older GenX and younger baby boomers in dual working households get it done? Not teleworking — not in 1999, 2001. And no professionals in DC lived near their moms then so that also isn’t the answer

I do think commutes weren’t an hour+ each way then. But mainly we just … did it.

Child of a young baby boomer: I was a latchkey kid and was expected to get places independently at a younger age. These days, my mom would have gotten arrested for leaving us alone for long periods of time, but we had no better choices and it was normal back then.

Yes, boomers with working parents basically, did it with benign neglect, latchkey kids, I ate basically a microwave meal for every dinner.

Also back then women were still just working basically pink collar jobs, so they would end the day and come home relatively early compared to a corporate job with a commute. And no activities, except maybe ones you would do after school, it used to be easy to get on the school sports team you didn’t have to train in travel soccer since age 4.

Ask for generation X they actually started the opt out revolution, they realized it was a bad deal and they just did not keep working. https://www.nytimes.com/2003/10/26/magazine/the-opt-out-revolution.html

Let me disabuse you all of the idea that GenX/younger baby boomers were all working pink collar jobs or part time in 1998. We were full-time lawyers and journalists and doctors and accountants. Perhaps not the THE Managing Partner of a 1000-lawyer firm — but not all part-time preschool teachers.

In 1999 Washington DC.

But, we still got it done. And our kids were not dining on Cheetos and they did play sports and instruments . But not to the insane degree today’s 8 yr olds do.

1999? Those are GenX moms. And they were starting the opt out revolution realizing it sucked.

In 1985, 60% of school age moms worked.

But out of all moms, only 15% were professional jobs.

Bullshit. Show your cites for those statistics

Here is an article about it:
https://www.nytimes.com/1985/11/20/garden/women-who-work-increasing.html

It’s pretty easy to figure out. Go look at what % of law school graduates in 1985 were women. Or med school. Certainly not many.

If I go look at my dad’s college yearbook, the business degrees are 99% men. Women are getting nursing or education degrees.

I grew up in an affluent community and don’t remember a single mother with a high earning job. Not one. But I knew plenty of male doctors, lawyers, bankers etc.

This is a Washington DC forum and my comments are about GenX / very young boomer moms working as journalists, lawyers, doctors and accountants in DC. DC in 1990-2005 was full of successful, FULL TIME lawyers, policy wonks, journalists and adjacent. We made it happen, imperfectly. Some days very imperfectly. We didn’t have our moms nearby or doordash. And we most certainly absolutely did not have work from home.

Look, I lived it. It was hard and everything suffered at different points. I empathize.

But do not tell me that we were all 15 hour a week administrative assistants. Not in DC.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:How did the older GenX and younger baby boomers in dual working households get it done? Not teleworking — not in 1999, 2001. And no professionals in DC lived near their moms then so that also isn’t the answer

I do think commutes weren’t an hour+ each way then. But mainly we just … did it.

Child of a young baby boomer: I was a latchkey kid and was expected to get places independently at a younger age. These days, my mom would have gotten arrested for leaving us alone for long periods of time, but we had no better choices and it was normal back then.

Yes, boomers with working parents basically, did it with benign neglect, latchkey kids, I ate basically a microwave meal for every dinner.

Also back then women were still just working basically pink collar jobs, so they would end the day and come home relatively early compared to a corporate job with a commute. And no activities, except maybe ones you would do after school, it used to be easy to get on the school sports team you didn’t have to train in travel soccer since age 4.

Ask for generation X they actually started the opt out revolution, they realized it was a bad deal and they just did not keep working. https://www.nytimes.com/2003/10/26/magazine/the-opt-out-revolution.html

Let me disabuse you all of the idea that GenX/younger baby boomers were all working pink collar jobs or part time in 1998. We were full-time lawyers and journalists and doctors and accountants. Perhaps not the THE Managing Partner of a 1000-lawyer firm — but not all part-time preschool teachers.

In 1999 Washington DC.

But, we still got it done. And our kids were not dining on Cheetos and they did play sports and instruments . But not to the insane degree today’s 8 yr olds do.

1999? Those are GenX moms. And they were starting the opt out revolution realizing it sucked.

In 1985, 60% of school age moms worked.

But out of all moms, only 15% were professional jobs.

Bullshit. Show your cites for those statistics

Here is an article about it:
https://www.nytimes.com/1985/11/20/garden/women-who-work-increasing.html

It’s pretty easy to figure out. Go look at what % of law school graduates in 1985 were women. Or med school. Certainly not many.

If I go look at my dad’s college yearbook, the business degrees are 99% men. Women are getting nursing or education degrees.

I grew up in an affluent community and don’t remember a single mother with a high earning job. Not one. But I knew plenty of male doctors, lawyers, bankers etc.

This is a Washington DC forum and my comments are about GenX / very young boomer moms working as journalists, lawyers, doctors and accountants in DC. DC in 1990-2005 was full of successful, FULL TIME lawyers, policy wonks, journalists and adjacent. We made it happen, imperfectly. Some days very imperfectly. We didn’t have our moms nearby or doordash. And we most certainly absolutely did not have work from home.

Look, I lived it. It was hard and everything suffered at different points. I empathize.

But do not tell me that we were all 15 hour a week administrative assistants. Not in DC.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I grew up around mostly single moms. They all worked FT and some had second jobs. It's just what they did. My mom worked FT and had around an hour commute. She did this for 40ish or so years. Everyone did.

I think parents these days are so tired because their kids have way too many activities. Stop signing your kids up for all of that. You're bringing this on yourself.

It’s an arms race. If you isn’t doing soccer travel at age 6, they won’t make high school or best club teams and won’t be recruited to best colleges etc, and their third tier college prospects will mean underemployment forever.

Yes single mothers worked, but a huge percentage of them lived with their own parents or roped in other family to help — they generally were flexible enough as a single adult household to move closer to family.

Or just left the kids to fend for themselves and lived on squalor. How exactly were they getting kids to school, working and commuting, making dinner, doing all chores etc? Something had to give.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:How did the older GenX and younger baby boomers in dual working households get it done? Not teleworking — not in 1999, 2001. And no professionals in DC lived near their moms then so that also isn’t the answer

I do think commutes weren’t an hour+ each way then. But mainly we just … did it.

Child of a young baby boomer: I was a latchkey kid and was expected to get places independently at a younger age. These days, my mom would have gotten arrested for leaving us alone for long periods of time, but we had no better choices and it was normal back then.

Yes, boomers with working parents basically, did it with benign neglect, latchkey kids, I ate basically a microwave meal for every dinner.

Also back then women were still just working basically pink collar jobs, so they would end the day and come home relatively early compared to a corporate job with a commute. And no activities, except maybe ones you would do after school, it used to be easy to get on the school sports team you didn’t have to train in travel soccer since age 4.

Ask for generation X they actually started the opt out revolution, they realized it was a bad deal and they just did not keep working. https://www.nytimes.com/2003/10/26/magazine/the-opt-out-revolution.html

Let me disabuse you all of the idea that GenX/younger baby boomers were all working pink collar jobs or part time in 1998. We were full-time lawyers and journalists and doctors and accountants. Perhaps not the THE Managing Partner of a 1000-lawyer firm — but not all part-time preschool teachers.

In 1999 Washington DC.

But, we still got it done. And our kids were not dining on Cheetos and they did play sports and instruments . But not to the insane degree today’s 8 yr olds do.

1999? Those are GenX moms. And they were starting the opt out revolution realizing it sucked.

In 1985, 60% of school age moms worked.

But out of all moms, only 15% were professional jobs.

Bullshit. Show your cites for those statistics

Here is an article about it:
https://www.nytimes.com/1985/11/20/garden/women-who-work-increasing.html

It’s pretty easy to figure out. Go look at what % of law school graduates in 1985 were women. Or med school. Certainly not many.

If I go look at my dad’s college yearbook, the business degrees are 99% men. Women are getting nursing or education degrees.

I grew up in an affluent community and don’t remember a single mother with a high earning job. Not one. But I knew plenty of male doctors, lawyers, bankers etc.

This is a Washington DC forum and my comments are about GenX / very young boomer moms working as journalists, lawyers, doctors and accountants in DC. DC in 1990-2005 was full of successful, FULL TIME lawyers, policy wonks, journalists and adjacent. We made it happen, imperfectly. Some days very imperfectly. We didn’t have our moms nearby or doordash. And we most certainly absolutely did not have work from home.

Look, I lived it. It was hard and everything suffered at different points. I empathize.

But do not tell me that we were all 15 hour a week administrative assistants. Not in DC.

You are so invested in the narrative of "I was tough and I made it work" that you are fighting a fight nobody picked. Nobody is saying there were zero full time lawyers in DC in 1999 who were also mothers. We're saying that there were fewer working mother Boomers, and the ones who were working mothers were hands-off in their parenting, and that the majority of women in the 1980s did not work white collar jobs. All of which are true statements.

But if you want to talk anecdotes: I was a lawyer in DC in the early 2000s too. There were 5 female partners in the DC office of my big firm and the firm was extremely proud that one of them took maternity leave in, like, 2006. She was the first female partner to do so, in the whole multi-office firm. Only one of the other female partners in DC had kids and she had them before law school. Most women who wanted kids left their firms for government, in which case yes they were still working full time but they absolutely stepped back in order to balance home and work.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:It’s awful - especially because we all know it does not need to be this way for many professional workers who sit on Teams. All of these anti- worker policies directly harm families and kids.

Amen! No wonder the birthright is declining.

Anonymous wrote:I grew up around mostly single moms. They all worked FT and some had second jobs. It's just what they did. My mom worked FT and had around an hour commute. She did this for 40ish or so years. Everyone did.

I think parents these days are so tired because their kids have way too many activities. Stop signing your kids up for all of that. You're bringing this on yourself.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:How did the older GenX and younger baby boomers in dual working households get it done? Not teleworking — not in 1999, 2001. And no professionals in DC lived near their moms then so that also isn’t the answer

I do think commutes weren’t an hour+ each way then. But mainly we just … did it.

Child of a young baby boomer: I was a latchkey kid and was expected to get places independently at a younger age. These days, my mom would have gotten arrested for leaving us alone for long periods of time, but we had no better choices and it was normal back then.

Yes, boomers with working parents basically, did it with benign neglect, latchkey kids, I ate basically a microwave meal for every dinner.

Also back then women were still just working basically pink collar jobs, so they would end the day and come home relatively early compared to a corporate job with a commute. And no activities, except maybe ones you would do after school, it used to be easy to get on the school sports team you didn’t have to train in travel soccer since age 4.

Ask for generation X they actually started the opt out revolution, they realized it was a bad deal and they just did not keep working. https://www.nytimes.com/2003/10/26/magazine/the-opt-out-revolution.html

Let me disabuse you all of the idea that GenX/younger baby boomers were all working pink collar jobs or part time in 1998. We were full-time lawyers and journalists and doctors and accountants. Perhaps not the THE Managing Partner of a 1000-lawyer firm — but not all part-time preschool teachers.

In 1999 Washington DC.

But, we still got it done. And our kids were not dining on Cheetos and they did play sports and instruments . But not to the insane degree today’s 8 yr olds do.

1999? Those are GenX moms. And they were starting the opt out revolution realizing it sucked.

In 1985, 60% of school age moms worked.

But out of all moms, only 15% were professional jobs.

Bullshit. Show your cites for those statistics

Here is an article about it:
https://www.nytimes.com/1985/11/20/garden/women-who-work-increasing.html

It’s pretty easy to figure out. Go look at what % of law school graduates in 1985 were women. Or med school. Certainly not many.

If I go look at my dad’s college yearbook, the business degrees are 99% men. Women are getting nursing or education degrees.

I grew up in an affluent community and don’t remember a single mother with a high earning job. Not one. But I knew plenty of male doctors, lawyers, bankers etc.

This is a Washington DC forum and my comments are about GenX / very young boomer moms working as journalists, lawyers, doctors and accountants in DC. DC in 1990-2005 was full of successful, FULL TIME lawyers, policy wonks, journalists and adjacent. We made it happen, imperfectly. Some days very imperfectly. We didn’t have our moms nearby or doordash. And we most certainly absolutely did not have work from home.

Look, I lived it. It was hard and everything suffered at different points. I empathize.

But do not tell me that we were all 15 hour a week administrative assistants. Not in DC.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:How did the older GenX and younger baby boomers in dual working households get it done? Not teleworking — not in 1999, 2001. And no professionals in DC lived near their moms then so that also isn’t the answer

I do think commutes weren’t an hour+ each way then. But mainly we just … did it.

Child of a young baby boomer: I was a latchkey kid and was expected to get places independently at a younger age. These days, my mom would have gotten arrested for leaving us alone for long periods of time, but we had no better choices and it was normal back then.

Yes, boomers with working parents basically, did it with benign neglect, latchkey kids, I ate basically a microwave meal for every dinner.

Also back then women were still just working basically pink collar jobs, so they would end the day and come home relatively early compared to a corporate job with a commute. And no activities, except maybe ones you would do after school, it used to be easy to get on the school sports team you didn’t have to train in travel soccer since age 4.

Ask for generation X they actually started the opt out revolution, they realized it was a bad deal and they just did not keep working. https://www.nytimes.com/2003/10/26/magazine/the-opt-out-revolution.html

Let me disabuse you all of the idea that GenX/younger baby boomers were all working pink collar jobs or part time in 1998. We were full-time lawyers and journalists and doctors and accountants. Perhaps not the THE Managing Partner of a 1000-lawyer firm — but not all part-time preschool teachers.

In 1999 Washington DC.

But, we still got it done. And our kids were not dining on Cheetos and they did play sports and instruments . But not to the insane degree today’s 8 yr olds do.

1999? Those are GenX moms. And they were starting the opt out revolution realizing it sucked.

In 1985, 60% of school age moms worked.

But out of all moms, only 15% were professional jobs.

Bullshit. Show your cites for those statistics

Here is an article about it:
https://www.nytimes.com/1985/11/20/garden/women-who-work-increasing.html

It’s pretty easy to figure out. Go look at what % of law school graduates in 1985 were women. Or med school. Certainly not many.

If I go look at my dad’s college yearbook, the business degrees are 99% men. Women are getting nursing or education degrees.

I grew up in an affluent community and don’t remember a single mother with a high earning job. Not one. But I knew plenty of male doctors, lawyers, bankers etc.

This is a Washington DC forum and my comments are about GenX / very young boomer moms working as journalists, lawyers, doctors and accountants in DC. DC in 1990-2005 was full of successful, FULL TIME lawyers, policy wonks, journalists and adjacent. We made it happen, imperfectly. Some days very imperfectly. We didn’t have our moms nearby or doordash. And we most certainly absolutely did not have work from home.

Look, I lived it. It was hard and everything suffered at different points. I empathize.

But do not tell me that we were all 15 hour a week administrative assistants. Not in DC.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:How did the older GenX and younger baby boomers in dual working households get it done? Not teleworking — not in 1999, 2001. And no professionals in DC lived near their moms then so that also isn’t the answer

I do think commutes weren’t an hour+ each way then. But mainly we just … did it.

Child of a young baby boomer: I was a latchkey kid and was expected to get places independently at a younger age. These days, my mom would have gotten arrested for leaving us alone for long periods of time, but we had no better choices and it was normal back then.

Yes, boomers with working parents basically, did it with benign neglect, latchkey kids, I ate basically a microwave meal for every dinner.

Also back then women were still just working basically pink collar jobs, so they would end the day and come home relatively early compared to a corporate job with a commute. And no activities, except maybe ones you would do after school, it used to be easy to get on the school sports team you didn’t have to train in travel soccer since age 4.

Ask for generation X they actually started the opt out revolution, they realized it was a bad deal and they just did not keep working. https://www.nytimes.com/2003/10/26/magazine/the-opt-out-revolution.html

Let me disabuse you all of the idea that GenX/younger baby boomers were all working pink collar jobs or part time in 1998. We were full-time lawyers and journalists and doctors and accountants. Perhaps not the THE Managing Partner of a 1000-lawyer firm — but not all part-time preschool teachers.

In 1999 Washington DC.

But, we still got it done. And our kids were not dining on Cheetos and they did play sports and instruments . But not to the insane degree today’s 8 yr olds do.

1999? Those are GenX moms. And they were starting the opt out revolution realizing it sucked.

In 1985, 60% of school age moms worked.

But out of all moms, only 15% were professional jobs.

Bullshit. Show your cites for those statistics

DP - You can't seriously think women commonly had white collar jobs in 1985, can you? Women's progress in education and in the workforce is very recent.

Here's a table of grad degrees awarded each year in the US and what percent went to women. The last column for doctor's degrees includes law, dentists, terminal degree in education, etc, not just PhDs. Women earned 30% of such degrees in 1980 and 35% in 1985.
https://nces.ed.gov/programs/digest/d15/tables/dt15_318.10.asp

Here's a chart on workforce participation that includes all kinds of jobs. Participation - working or looking for work of any kind - is about 50% for mothers of kids under 6 in 1985.
https://www.dol.gov/agencies/wb/data/lfp/mother-age-youngestchild

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:How did the older GenX and younger baby boomers in dual working households get it done? Not teleworking — not in 1999, 2001. And no professionals in DC lived near their moms then so that also isn’t the answer

I do think commutes weren’t an hour+ each way then. But mainly we just … did it.

Child of a young baby boomer: I was a latchkey kid and was expected to get places independently at a younger age. These days, my mom would have gotten arrested for leaving us alone for long periods of time, but we had no better choices and it was normal back then.

Yes, boomers with working parents basically, did it with benign neglect, latchkey kids, I ate basically a microwave meal for every dinner.

Also back then women were still just working basically pink collar jobs, so they would end the day and come home relatively early compared to a corporate job with a commute. And no activities, except maybe ones you would do after school, it used to be easy to get on the school sports team you didn’t have to train in travel soccer since age 4.

Ask for generation X they actually started the opt out revolution, they realized it was a bad deal and they just did not keep working. https://www.nytimes.com/2003/10/26/magazine/the-opt-out-revolution.html

Let me disabuse you all of the idea that GenX/younger baby boomers were all working pink collar jobs or part time in 1998. We were full-time lawyers and journalists and doctors and accountants. Perhaps not the THE Managing Partner of a 1000-lawyer firm — but not all part-time preschool teachers.

In 1999 Washington DC.

But, we still got it done. And our kids were not dining on Cheetos and they did play sports and instruments . But not to the insane degree today’s 8 yr olds do.

1999? Those are GenX moms. And they were starting the opt out revolution realizing it sucked.

In 1985, 60% of school age moms worked.

But out of all moms, only 15% were professional jobs.

Bullshit. Show your cites for those statistics

Here is an article about it:
https://www.nytimes.com/1985/11/20/garden/women-who-work-increasing.html

It’s pretty easy to figure out. Go look at what % of law school graduates in 1985 were women. Or med school. Certainly not many.

If I go look at my dad’s college yearbook, the business degrees are 99% men. Women are getting nursing or education degrees.

I grew up in an affluent community and don’t remember a single mother with a high earning job. Not one. But I knew plenty of male doctors, lawyers, bankers etc.