Looking after your own children IS work

[Bumpitybumper]

Oxford Dictionary definition of "work":
activity involving mental or physical effort done in order to achieve a purpose or result

AIBU to suggest that the people that suggest that looking after one's own children isn't work are wrong and in some cases are actively trying to devalue and undermine the people (usually women) that do the majority of childcare?

Would be really interested to understand how anyone can read this definition and argue that looking after children isn't work.

Why would anyone (other than that child's other parent) place value on you looking after your own kids?

as a society we should. Why do we think it's acceptable to look down at people? There is value in people looking after their children.

How many people have jobs that have actually no value whatsoever to society? I don't believe even on here all posters are doctors or emergency personal..

It's such a ridiculous debate. SAH parents don't deserve a medal, but it doesn't mean it's acceptable to insult them either.

@Dividing
I think your post contains a refreshing and worthwhile perspective that deserves more presence in this debate

I agree that it is work. However whether you're a working parent or stay at home parent you are always a 'full time parent' - because you have children and whilst they may not be with you every hour of every given day, doesn't stop you being a 'full time parent'.

I think that there's far too much competition between those who work and those who are stay at home parent's.

We of course share our own personal circumstances regarding this topic and oftentimes it seems that we forget that what is true for one person, isn't often true for others.

I'm a SAHM and I do find it hard work, I love looking after my DC and the housework/admin/multiple appointments are mainly handled by me. But twin toddlers with learning delays going through simultaneous separation anxiety and bad sleep is harder than I ever thought it could be (mainly because DD has gone into full on velcro mode and DS fights to have cuddles at the same time). I'm not a homemaker, I find housework mind-numbingly dull and repetitive (I'm not alone on that one I know) whilst even in the crappiest jobs that I've worked - I never felt the same level of pressure to do my duties.

I may not be beholden to a boss - but I am beholden to my children who are far more demanding in my experience and far more unreasonable - honestly I would love to go back to work if I could because I find working easier. But the health professionals looking after my twins and their development insist that having at least one parent at home is more beneficial. Plus my earning potential wouldn't cover both twins childcare costs, we'd be in a deficit. This was why I became a SAHM in the first place.

I don't think comparing the two as though they are the same experience for each individual parent/family is helpful or fair. It may not be paid work - but it is work!

The annual economic value of childcare carried out by stay-at-home parents is £320bn, according to a 2016 estimate by the Office for National Statistics. That’s a lot of “non work”

As far as I can tell, no one is disputing that raising children has economic value. A SAHM creates and consumes value simultaneously, or if she has a partner she creates a surplus value that's simultaneously consumed by the him.

But this doesn't mean that it's of any relevance to the outside world, being that the vast majority of them are doing unpaid work of their own, like making sandwiches or doing laundry or whatever.

It's not work, working is providing someone else with some benefit or service, when you are looking after your own children you are doing something that is in your own best interest.

I.e. providing your children with care and support yourself so that someone else doesn't have to.

Wether a parent works or not I have the utmost respect for them and their decisions about their lifestyle choice and no one fully knows someone else's situation well enough to judge them on that decision.

However if providing for the children means that the parent is put in a situation where they need to work, they should do that as it is their responsibility to provide for the children.

A basic economics book would tell you that parenting is work. Just not paid, and excluded from economic data.

Caring for sick/disabled or elderly relatives also comes under this.

Taking care of the vulnerable saves the government millions.

@Dividingthementalload
I wasn’t working inside the home, I was enjoying the privilege of being a stay at home parent and grateful for every tough, joyful, demanding, repetitive, rewarding, and deathly boring day where I got to be my children’s primary influencer
Whilst I accept your viewpoint, I would like to emphasise that being a SAHP isn't always a privilege. Many women feel obliged to take on the role due they can't afford to stay in paid employment or they feel that the decision to be a SAHP is best for their children/family even if it's not a role they would have chosen for themselves.

SAHPs are not necessarily a privileged class and therefore do not automatically need to find things effortless or be grateful.

Who's insulting anyone? I'm saying why do you need to seek value from anywhere else? Realistically you being a SAHP makes zero difference to anyone but you and your partner. So long as it's valued by your partner that's all that matters.

What are other people supposed to do? You can't expect other people to value the fact that you stay at home looking after your own kids. You can expect people to not pass comment on it, be negative about it etc... But value it? Why? What difference does it make to me if OP looks after her kids at home?

I value healthcare workers, police officers, paramedics etc... Because they all benefit my life.

I don't give a shit if Jane down the road stays at home with her kids, why would I?

I'm not suggesting there's anything wrong with it but suggesting society should 'value SAHMs' why???

Well, housework is work. The clue is in the name. Housework and caring for one's own children aren't paid work, but they are work.

There is value in people looking after their children

To that person's immediate family unit, yes. To society?? I'm not sure.

Taking care of the vulnerable saves the government millions

Being at home while your children are out at school isn't quite this though is it.

If you are genuinely doing something worthwhile during that time good for you. What many of us resent is the many SAHPs who make out like household chores & tasks relating to being a parent of school aged kids etc are equivalent to a full time paid job . That's simply demeaning to those of us who manage to do those things (and do them well) in addition to a full time paid role. We don't not nurture our kids because we earn money while they are at school.

And I'd happily be a SAHM btw. But I wouldn't think I was being of any value to society as a whole by being so. I would be being valuable to my family. Which there's nothing wrong with.

Teapot13 I agree, but i don't think housework takes 40 hours a week. Or even the 30 or so when kids are at school.

@Bumpitybumper so you are only benefiting yourself.

Also. The amount of money that SAHP save the family isn't a good thing for the economy. Again it only benefits the family themselves.

@MarginalGain I think a lot of people are saying precisely that

And interestingly you’ve selected the most mundane and menial aspects of being a SAHP In terms of other things that everyone else has to do: the sandwiches laundry illustrating the all pervasive “pat on the head” some of us feel we get from others.

The Treasury Select Committee has not that long ago been critical and questioning of the economic impact extending free childcare has had upon the economy, so in terms of creating and consuming value I don’t think your value analogy is limited to a scrutiny of stay at home parent.

Improving labour market activity and increasing or widening qualitative labour force participation are not the same thing.

@LaurieMarlow

My point is. Having a child who has had time and effort poured into it is better than one who has been left to its own devices. Parents with an outside job can absolutely do these things.

The fact remains that

1. A SAHP has more time to do these things.
2. Having changing caretakers, e.g. au pair who leaves at the end of the year, nursery worker who changes job, even different early years teachers how every year have to learn what your child is like has a mental and emotional impact. I know of young American children whose first language has been that of the nanny due to time spent with them. Then they just disappear from their lives.

Of course it is worse to have a drugged up SAHP than an emotionally stable parent who pays others to care for the child when they are at a job.

I found being SAHM much easier than going out to work, primarily I think because my ex was a lazy arse so I did all the housework/chores as well.
I would love women to stick up for each other the way that men stick up for each other. That’s all.

it it really a positive thing in the long term for kids to be left to their own device when their parents are at work?

I am not so sure either.

@Dooofle
@itsallthedramaMickiloveit

Where will the workforce in 20-70 years time be supplied from? Particularly important when we live in an aging population.

@NoIDontWatchLoveIsland

I think perhaps there are quite a lot of SAHP of pre school or reception age children with younger ones also that are present here........

@itsallthedramaMickiloveit
so you are only benefiting yourself
I have previously mentioned that lots of jobs have no societal value. There are whole professions that actually take money from wider society with every pound they earn (legal, advertising, finance) and some industries that have a massive detriment to our society (tobacco, junk food).

The people who carry out the paid roles in these sectors would undoubtedly be considered to be undertaking "work" so obviously for most people the concept of work isn't connected to the amount of benefit an activity delivers to society. Why are SAHPs held to a higher standard than others when it comes to the need for them to provide wider benefit in order for their activities to be deemed "work"?

I have never claimed that money saved through not paying childcare fees is good for the wider economy. I don't think that affects whether looking after your own children is work or not though.

It’s ‘work’ but it’s not a ‘job’.

If it were a job nobody would apply!!

Where will the workforce in 20-70 years time be supplied from?

It's not just children of stay at home parents that will be employed in the future Children of working parents will also likely contribute to the workforce..

I agree with your latest post OP that being a SAHP is a really diverse situation and therefore pointless to define or quantify really.

Some people are stay at home parents because their financial circumstances allow them to be. Some people are stay at home parents because their financial circumstances force them to be. Those are totally different scenarios but both exist and are equally valid.

My ideal would be to be a SAHP until my youngest was 5, study during that time and get a job when they are at school.

My reality is that I will be back at work in a year when my youngest is one, studying while working and then going for promotion when graduated. It's not my absolute ideal but it's close enough I guess.

@Bumpity
You are wasting your time With some of these posters
But hey I agree with you 🙂