If staying at home because the family can genuinely afford it, it's still worthwhile ensuring you maintain evidence of employability and retain a sense of worth outside the home in the local community, so voluntary work, training relevant to the workplace (eg bookkeeping skills, computing courses, etc), etc, can be useful while being a SAHM - keeps up contacts who can give references if/when you want to go back to work, keeps the brain active, shows you have some self-discipline and an interest in what is going on around you etc. Other than that, it's a colossal reduction in stress for everyone in the family to have one person always available for sick children, organising and taking children to appointments, attending school events and meetings, dealing with electricians/plumbers or anyone else who needs ro visit the house during the working day, doing the diy and finances, shopping, housework, gardening, cooking, giving lifts to after school activities (and organising them), doing the school run, organising days out and holidays, ensuring homework is done, birthday present and party organising, etc, and still having the energy and time to be happy, pleasant company and interested in everyone else's day when everyone else gets home. I'm not sure why someone who would be doing the job they are doing anyway, even if they didn't have a dw or dh, would feel the need to be hugely resentful if their partner wasn't also doing paid work outside the home, if there was plenty of money coming in, as both partners working would simply mean both partners being more stressed trying to keep on top of everything for extra money that neither party felt to be necessary. Mumsnet is full of hugely resentful posts about who is or should be responsible for what because neither person has the time to do it all properly. It's a lot easier to do it all if one person spends less time working outside the home than the other. If, on the other hand, the paid worker loathes their paid work, or the person at home loathes their role and feels disempowered by it, but hated employment, too, then they are likely to be a grumpy, resentful git either way! 