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.

The dream would be 2x full time workers who both took equal responsibility and had a degree of flexibility, plus good childcare.

Not in my world.

Much better for two part time workers, or for a family to be able to exist on one wage.

I was wondering today if house prices are so high because it's normal for two people in a couple to both work without one taking a career break.

It's fine with me. Perhaps you should re-read your posts and understand that whether you meant to or not, you sound as though you are bashing SAHP.

Not in my world either. My dream world is one full time, one not working when young, and then part time- with me being the one who doesn't need full time work.

Ps my last post was in response to namechange. I think being a midwife is a brilliant career, btw, and can fully understand why you wouldn't want to give that up and am also very pleased that you didn't want to, given the shortage of midwives.

My DC were only ever cared for by either DH or I morethan
No CC.
We supported each other in our carers and parenting
How will you return to your chosen career 20 odd years later morethan
genuine question ??
5 years out and I would have to retrain !

Im not bashing SAHP= I was one !
So perhaps Im qualified to say my experience as a SAHM- fairly outgoing does not compare in any way to my experience as a midwife,experiencing the lives of others.*

breast fed 2 x DC for 2 years each, brought up DSD, babywore ,co slept, grew own veg, chickens, lived in a yurt

• I experienced that sorry

namechange

I was an entertainment consultant and an entertainer. My dh is a musician and the only childcare that would have been compatable would have been a nanny.
My dh is still a musician and I help a lot with the business, making joint decisions with dh.
Over the years I've kept up with what was happening through him and friends also in the business.
Quite often people will call and ask to speak to me before him, just because i can sort things out more effectively.
I'm thinking of expanding the business when dd goes to school in september and working out if it will pay a wage for me.
I am qualified in management and hold an Executive Diploma in MGT from the CMI. Not that it means anything, but looks good on paperwork

I don't have any idea what an entertainment consultant would do ?
Is that like managing a band ????

My apologies for being rude, then, namechange . You just made it sound as though you didn't much enjoy the SAH years and therefore couldn't really imagine why anyone else would! I know plenty who did enjoy SAH life. Loving the career you left behind and having to re qualify if you stay out too long make things more complicated than if you merely thought your career was just one way to spend your time and now you'd be happy to do something different with your life, and then something different again.

Or, I guess, it actually makes your life more simple, as why would you give up a career that means so much to you?! So actually, it makes you lucky and your life simpler in many ways!

Well I know what a midwife does and I take my hat off to you. I think you deserve twice the money you get paid. mine saved my life, not in a physical giving birth type of way. I will pm you sometime, you may have come across a similar case, but I was told is quite rare.

As an entertainment consultant I worked for private companies, public sector not so much, and rich individuals.

If they were organising a function or event I advised what type of music, entertainment, act would be most fitting. Sometimes I supplied these myself through a type of agency, some of the work I did myself.
An example would be a 50th themed birthday party where the host was expecting to pay as much as you would for a wedding, so we're talking many k. Depending on the work involved/ scale I could also provide outside caterers/ bars, glass hire etc. I suppose you'd describe it as bespoke services.
The work paid extremely well but had to travel a lot and of course very unsociable hours. On top of this dh also has a career as an international jazz musician so it just was not going to work with dc and I didn't want it to iyswim. I never really did anything else only entertainment.

I adored being a SAHM but being a midwife has thrown me into life in a totally different way.
You are not thinking about yourself and your DC all the time but you have the life of a mother and a child in your hands.
Sometimes it so bloody scary but its brilliant !
Utterly life changing !

Blimey morethan people spend as much on parties as weddings ?!< who knew>

Alas, I didn't find being a solicitor specialising in project finance gave me remotely the same thrill! [ grin] My dh, on the other hand, does as his career what he would otherwise do as his hobby and wouldn't want to do anything else. There are a great many alternative careers I would be happy to do!

I don't think a business like that could survive now, but I'm sure there's still the odd one somewhere
It was good for large corporates trying to hide money/ spend money before the new tax year. These were usually functions in March.

Then of course there were the weddings, great big massive dreamy things. Of course as a supplier of services there was commission, so if you booked the flowers you got 10%. it paid to get to know all the right businesses in that particular market.

The private individuals were the greatest challenge as they told you what they wanted or the resources they had and wanted somebody to put it all together.
I did a King Arthur themed party in a castle for a 21st Birthday, it cost them thousands. They owned the castle of course.

The pressure stress and hard work were great for a single person or even as a couple but I just couldn't imagine doing anything else and didn't want to continue when ds1 came along.

I can see why most people want to work in some form or other but I just couldn't.

We have four dc, just DH works. We really struggle and he has a very good wage.
We don't have any holidays and rarely have meals out. But, we feel like the kids need me here with them.
My brother and his wife have 2 dc, both work and are always moaning about having no money, and then get new cars or book a holiday!
Just different decisions people make.

Yes, I would have to work to pay bills but so would every other divorced person.

But it is much more difficult to earn money if you have to start from scratch having had a significant career break. You many feel that you could pick up where you left off morethan, but that isn't a realistic expectation for most people.

The same difficulties would apply if a partner became ill or died. Financial security is a big motivator for many people.

Chicken may have declined in price but turkeys will always vote for Christmas.

Also, morethan, in the event of a divorce if you are living mortgage free in a three bedroom house, where would your ex be living? Most people aren't in a position to turn one household into two without significant additional cost, particularly if both want to live somewhere that will be a home for their children.

Equally, it might be possible to support an ex SAH Partner amicably while both parties are still single, less easy with a new partner and more children.

I'm not saying that any of this would apply to you, just that these are fairly run of the mill financial difficulties that people face on divorce.

Children are really bad for your finances, yet people still have them. Divorce is really bad for your finances, yet people still do it. Setting up your own business can wipe out all your savings and put you in a vulnerable position, yet people still do it. Doing a job you hate just because it pays well can make you seriously depressed, yet people still do it. Some people spend so much of their lives protecting themselves from things that may or may not happen that they never do what they actually wanted to in life. Some people take no precautions whatsoever and lunge from one thing to another without thought for the consequences. Most people take calculated risks. Go look at your own life and ask yourself how happy you are with it before you go telling other people off for being happy with theirs and their life choices.

Although, going back to the OP, I don't think it is the norm for both parents to work full time. I'm sure I would have come across more if it was.

Go look at your own life and ask yourself how happy you are with it before you go telling other people off for being happy with theirs and their life choices.

I'm not questioning anybody's life choices, and have specifically said that I don't question morethan's life choices.

The OP says:

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.

I'm just suggesting that the biggest influence on working patterns is not a governmental conspiracy to force people to do jobs they hate but the fact that many people like going to work and value financial security.

I wasn't talking specifically to you, merrymouse, but drawing my own conclusion from the thread.

The way in which people view their work and their attitude to work is very complex rabbit - there is tons of research into it and broadly speaking we are divided into 2 groups depending on attitude, locus of control, personality etc.

Interestingly ( Im a bit rusty here) I seem to remember that those with an external locus of control believe that events/life are controlled externally to them - by governments, employers, those in positions of authority (police,forces) or by fate etc. They are not internally motivated.
They generally do not have a positive attitude to work.

Those with an internal locus of control believe that they can influence and have control of aspects of their life, ie work hard and I will achieve what I want in life.
They have high levels of internal motivation and enjoy work.

That's a bit simplistic but there really are differing attitudes to work that generally define how we view it !! ( rather than the job itself)

namechange, I never read that before but it seems extremely accurate. Since I was very little I have felt I can achieve anything, make things happen and I genuinely find it hard to understand why a lot of other women (and men) don't and think life is something that happens to them. So I say something logical about do XYZ and then you get ABC and they don't get it and I don't get them. Slightly off topic but interesting. It will apply to mothers at home too of course as they might well have actively chosen that and plenty target the man with wealth in just as determined a way as the hard working career person who thinks she is in charge of her fate.

I liked this above...."Chicken may have declined in price but turkeys will always vote for Christmas." Sexist men need to do nothing when there are so many women around keen to continue sexist patterns of woman at home serving whilst men work.

Finally, on divorce, some people do end up with an unmortgaged house after divorce (my husband for example - the lower earner). So the example above of someone who says on divorce she would have that (in fact in our case he has 4 bed rooms) that can be the case for some people after a long marriage. Or there is the other risk - husband gets the children and house even if he had a stay at home wife (although unlikely) and wife moves in with her mother or a bed sit and goes back to full time work to pay the child support.