"I could not be funded by a man" - Really?

[aokii]

I have noticed that this line, " I could not be funded by a man" is often trotted out on here. Frequently, it is directed at SAHMs.

I take issue with this for two reasons -

1. Unless you are in the type of marriage where you have totally separate funds, you are inevitably being "funded by a man" to a greater or lesser extent anyway - particularly if you are the lower earner or you work part-time.

2. Unlike in families where there are two working parents, a family with a SAHM is not going to be paying childcare costs. So although the SAHM is obviously not doing paid work, her role is still a direct and significant saving.

No doubt people will come on now and talk about "financial vulnerability," re- SAHMs and this is a fair point. However, it is far from a given that SAHMs are any more financially vulnerable than the next woman. Nobody should ever just assume this.

I'm aware that there will be many women who earn more than their husbands and have separate finances. There will be couples who both work flexibly around each other and will argue a SAHP would not be a saving for them as they don't need to use childcare anyway, etc etc. But I less interested in personal anecdotes. I'm talking more generally about the vast majority of families with parents who both work and have shared finances. Could they honestly say they could maintain the same lifestyle without their DH's income coming into the household? If "no," then they are at least part-funded by a man surely?

AIBU to say that before tossing out the line, "I could not be funded by a man," people on here should look at themselves.

Dontmakeher - Thankyou.

It's not only types of jobs that can determine where the 'breaking point' is in families. Lots of people on here have been very honest about how they found two working parents was too much due to children with SEN, mental health issues, other caring responsibilities. Or just changed in life's circumstances. Even if you don't consciously plan to be a SAHM, you never know.

@aokii

No I'm not

You just keep changing the goal posts

Your point was these millionaire families need a sahm because they only see their kids for minutes a day.

Yet some how that doesn't apply to your oh.

So if ot doesn't apply to your oh, it clearly doesn't need to apply to anyone else

So no need for a sahm.

Thst is a very er, interesting take on what I said. But I think you know that and will just say anything to argue with anything.

@aokii

I know a lot of SAHMs and they are married to finance city types, entrepreneurs, hedge fund managers and that kind of thing. If someone has made a lot of money, or multi millions, they won't have done that working a 40 hour week. It takes a lot more than that and I would say very often, the wives are SAHMs to kind of balance things out in the family , so that it all doesn't reach ' breaking point." It's not that these husbands are "opting out if childcare" necessarily. It's just the reality of those kinds of jobs.

I can understand how this family got to that point and who can blame them. I have known people in similar dilemmas.

But again, and at the risk of sounding blunt, some of us don't have the safety net of a SAHM to "balance things out" and if we get to "breaking point" and can't keep up with our life admin or cleaning or our children's homework that's just tough shit. I don't work 14 hour days (although I do usually work 10 hour days) and I sure as hell don't earn £250k per year. But I do sometimes do crazy hours (often from home). And there ain't anyone at home who can "balance things out" for me. I just have to crack on with it.

Again, I could never hold it against any individual family who, faced with this dilemma, decides childcare is more important than having just a bit more money.

But again, if we had way of structuring society which didn't rely on this all or nothing approach to work v family, it would be much better both for individuals and for society. And these kinds of "balls to the wall" jobs (such as finance), where you're expected to work like a nutter, are predicated on there being someone at home to pick up the slack.

If some of these people who work 14 hour days worked 10 hour days instead and built in a bit of time to do school runs, the odd parents evening, worked from home a few days a week etc, it would normalise this as part of the culture. Making women in that environment feeling less ostracised and enabling other men to play a bigger role in their families without being made to feel they aren't sufficiently competitive. Over time, this could have a big cultural shift which would benefit everyone.

I'm not under any illusions that this will happen overnight (I work in an industry adjacent to this so I know the culture). But surely just throwing your hands up and saying: "ah well, that's the way it is" is kind of defeatist?

I don't disagree with you thepeople.

I was just trying to describe the demographic around me and thinking about the circumstances that led them to have SAHMs (and a SAHD in one case). It's very common where I live.

Its what you actually said.

Not a take on it.

I can quote the post if you like?

What are you talking about now?

Your point?

I'd be PERFECTLY content being funded..by anyone!! Unfortunately I've had to fund myself since I got divorced 22 years ago, and it's been bloody hard work and I'm alway skint 😢 I live in a crappy rented house, never have any money, work 70 hours a week and hate my life. I'd swap for a life of luxury any day!

I told you about a friend of mine who travelled a lot with work and her husband was also out late entertaining in the evenings with work related stuff. They had a nanny for a few years, but as the children got older, it no longer felt tenable for various reasons, so he became a SAHD (Aldi she had also been head-hunter for a role she couldn't turn down at the time).

One family who happen to be good friends of ours. I could tell you about other friends and neighbours who have SAHMs and dime DHs are there all the time WFH, some less so. Some have sold companies snd retired in their 40s. Some still commute. So what?

You seem to have this fixation in your head that any man who has a SAHM has opted out if childcare completely, You have a very black and white way of thinking, but the reality is more like shades of grey and obviously every SAHM family is not the same.

(for the descent into stealth bragging by some)

You literally said minutes a day with their children.

That was your entire point about having to have a sahm. That these jobs with very long hours have to be done.

Breaking point etc.

C'mon.

Don't act like you're not moving the goalposts cause you can't explain the contradiction

I can see how it might have come across as a stealth bag and I hold my hands up and sincerely apologise for that, but I was responding directly to a poster saying that anyone who starts a business such as my husband is by default greedy, exploitative and paying low wages because this is ridiculous and patently untrue.

If some of these people who work 14 hour days worked 10 hour days instead and built in a bit of time to do school runs, the odd parents evening, worked from home a few days a week etc, it would normalise this as part of the culture. Making women in that environment feeling less ostracised and enabling other men to play a bigger role in their families without being made to feel they aren't sufficiently competitive. Over time, this could have a big cultural shift which would benefit everyone.

Dunno. The company dh works for ticks many of those boxes. He does in the ballpark of 10 to 14 hour days but structured as much as possible around family, I.e he's working now. His team do 3 days a week at home, avoid meetings at school and nursery pick ups times because several of them are fathers and he hasn't missed a school or preschool event. When I was ill, he worked from home full time to look after me and newborn dc1. Yet perhaps because they won't allow compressed hours or part time, they don't have a single female senior staff member and the junior ones don't last long for whatever reason. I think it will be a very slow shift.

Topgub - this is really odd now.

Some families have SAHMs because it's too much to have two parents in jobs that require very long hours and lots of travel. It's all very well you saying, "go part time", but this is not the nature of what they do. Su it's either a) have a live-in nanny five days a week or b) one of you SAH.

Its not only about the number of hours spent with your kids or this peculiar fixation you have about the "magic number." It's also about headspace and stress levels snd mental health and how this impacts the kids if two parents are frequently arriving home stressed, jetlagged and overwhelmed with work issues and demands 24/7. It's these kind of families where something has to give quite often and this is why you find more SAHMs in that type of set-up.

You know that isn't what I said.

I wasn't referring to you

@aokii

Me pointing out your contradictions isn't odd or peculiar

Having lots of energy for your children is the opposite of very stressed and overwhelmed.

And as 5128gap says, it's a choice to do these roles/these hours

Its not compulsory for both parents to work 70 hour weeks

Nor is it compulsory for it to be the man who works. You keep trying to justify it but all you're doing is reinforcing sexist gender stereotypes

no one said anyone who starts a business is greedy and exploitative.

You cant deny how common it is

If business owners would rather spend time working for their business and making more and more money, than spend time with their kids, thats their choice

But it is a choice

TopGub - You take me describing the reality of what I see around me as me saying things 'should' be a certain way. When, what I am giving you Is a direct observation.

Hoe many SAHMs do you actually know? What do you base all your sweeping statements about SAHM families on, exactly?

Everything iIn life is a choice - yes., But the fact is, choice or not, the world has its hedge fund managers, film directors, entrepreneurs, soldiers and all types of jobs that involve certain commitments and where you can't just say "hello, I'd like to job share please and just work 37 hours so can be home for the school run."

Yiu might get to that point as you Braine more senior / experienced and have more control on are able to step back a bit..But that takes time.,

Living with someone who frequently works overseas or longer hours, or perhaps evenings because they are working on a US time zone, is very different to living with someone who clicks off at 5, switches off and doesn't bring work home with them.

Regsrdkess of whether you think these jobs should exist if not is irrelevant - they DO exist.

I am not saying only men can do city type jobs. Wtf! I'm just telling you that MY direct observation is that there are still snd currently more men in those jobs. I'm talking directly from experience if a sample size of about maybe 100 friends and people at the schools and neighbours I know right now. It is what it is.

I live in a part of London where most people have those types of jobs. That's why they are here. Nobody was born here..Yes it's a choice at the outset - but so what? People do those jobs - fact. Different jobs impact families differently.

There is no contradiction in this, it's a statement of fact. I'm not arguing people SHOULD have to work crazy hours. I'm just telling you they DO and for some people it's not negotiable.

Different families, different contexts, different decisions. I don't know why I even need to be explaining this. You are incredibly naive if you think everyone can be like you and you husband and work fixed hours or shifts around each other.

The contradiction lies in trying to argue that people (men) have no choice in working these hours while at the same time acknowledging that they do in fact have a choice over whether or not to be in the jobs requiring them.
These jobs are not essential. And even if they were, if enough of the people they want in them stood up and said, no, I'm not going to spend my every waking hour working, there would be no option but to make changes.
The fact is they don't. Because it's not enough to earn six figures, they are driven by greed and ego to make even more.

Now if that's the choice they wish to make for their own lives, fine. And if there are women who want to take on the entire family burden to allow them to, again, social issues aside, fine.
Its not the choice I have issue with, its the idea there is no choice, the likening of the SAH partners of these men, with SAHM or indeed of working mums, who genuinely have no choice. Truly, there is no 'justification' for the set up you describe, but if you're happy, you don't need one.

But "choice" is never that simple. And who are you to declare what jobs are essential and what are not?

I remember being at a friend's house years ago because she called me one evening and said she couldn't cope. I had my eldest with me and a newborn and her kids were the same age. Her husband was /is a lawyer and never got home before 11. She then had to make him dinner and was up all night at intervals feeding the baby. That DH was hard work. She was exhausted and I remember feeling really bad for her. But the point is, that DH has trained for many years to be a lawyer and if you're going to do thst, thrn you have to do what it takes. I don't have to be a lawyer to know that to get to partner level (or whatever they call it) you have to put the hours in initially. Or at least that was the culture where he worked. You can't just give up or get a simple 9-5 because you have already committed to a mortgage. Yes, in theory, you could sell up and move to a cheap place, but how many people di that in reality? In your 30s people may take the stress for a certain period because they know it pay dividends and buy the family more choices at a later stage.

If you train for 7 years to be a surgeon, then one day you will find you indeed become a surgeon and then you have to do the job and the hours it entails, even if they are long and stressful. You can say being a surgeon is 'choice' and nobody HAS to do that job and they're all selfish because they didn't choose a 9-5. But that's daft because it's obvious some people ARE surgeons - or lawyers or city bankers or film directors or soldiers or CEOs - and once you're in a job, then you're in it and you have to do it.

At no point have I argued that these families don't exist.

They do, albeit a minority.

You appear to be suggesting it's inevitable and unavoidable.

Its not.

Its a choice like any other. One that reinforces sexist stereotypes.

@5128gap

These jobs are not essential. And even if they were, if enough of the people they want in them stood up and said, no, I'm not going to spend my every waking hour working, there would be no option but to make changes.
The fact is they don't. Because it's not enough to earn six figures, they are driven by greed and ego to make even more.

You're right at a big picture level. Certainly society doesn't "need" these jobs and they build inherent inequalities into the system at every level.

But I think its a bit simplistic to say people in these jobs are driven only by greed and ego. Certainly there's an element of that but there's an aspect which has a particular bearing on male/female roles which you haven't mentioned.

I basically work in this environment/culture (not paid these figures but very much in this world). And there are lot of people in this world and a lot of women in particular who have a real scarcity mindset.

I freely admit to being part of the problem because I'm one of these people who over-services and takes on more than I can do, to show I'm useful. And I do this because I'm a single mum so I'm really really paranoid about losing my career and not having enough money to support my child. And, by extension, of being accused of lazy/flaky/disorganised (which people are apt to do because I wfh etc).

But I'm sure there are a lot of men who have this mindset too. And while at a big picture level we ought to be working to change it, its worth being aware that there is quite a lot of basic human fear behind people in these jobs, along with greed. And as long as "big" jobs with big money exist, this is hard to change.

Thankyou thepeople.