to think dual person 'full time' worker family households should never have become the norm?

[workingdilemma]

Was thinking about the other thread talking about tax credits etc.

Around 40 years ago, as a society we'd reached a point where one person working in a household was enough to support a young family.

Now we've ended up where it's pretty much required to have both working full time to be able to afford the same lifestyle - mainly due to the insane 'cost' of housing.

It would have been far better to have had both people in a couple working perhaps part time to allow engagement with the world of work, and also a healthier work/life balance.

Why did we end up like this? Was it all an orchestrated plan to keep the debt cycle going - after all, you can lend on two incomes now for a mortgage. Lovely jubbly for the debt pushers. Is that why the banks and governments encourage this?

I dunno, but I do yearn for a better way to deal with the problems we're having now then everyone demonising each other.

Interesting thread!

I have been part of a 2 full time working family with 2/3 kids and it's hard, even with good childcare!

I am now a single parent and not working and I do have a lot more time for the children. I can attend random assemblies, multiple sports days etc which I found pretty hard to do when working. Especially for more than one child - employers run out of patience quickly!

Having said that, I miss the social interaction of the workplace and I struggle to find ad-hoc childcare which I could do before easily with the DC nursery if I had a hosp appt / needed a haircut etc!

I think it helps a lot if you have family support - but not everyone has this, especially with everyone working longer these days.

workingdilemma - you need to put your desire for flexibility into practice - the thread was never going to stick rigidly to your original aims and desires when you started it!

Wow! I've never seen quite so many duplicate posts!

Sorry what did you say daddies ? I didn't quite catch it

Also i don't know any people who delayed having children because they had bought a 5 bed house / who work full time because they feel they have to have a huge house and two cars. I really don't

Not sure about this, life has always been hard for the less well off. It just seems our generation is made up of more people less well off than our parents and grandparents.

I think we can also sometimes suffer under a delusion as to how well off we are /should be I.e. We buy into the idea that having certain trappings/ education level means we ought to be able to afford a certain size house / one parent at home etc

Bloody hell Daddies you just filled an entire page on my phone! WTF did you do???!!

workingdilemma
How about you read the OP again, which is explicitly
Not about women giving up work
Not about one incomefamilies
but about both partners working flexibly to achieve a balance. Once again we've ended up mired in it being about feminism.

And how about YOU read the replies which don't recognise your OP and that for many families, both parents working long/hard hours is not a modern phenomenon. And that posters on the thread (including me) value the freedom their f/t job provides and do manage a work/ life balance or appreciate that actually, they have it quite good.

daddies can you report some of those duplicates and get them deleted?