To think SAHM with young DC deserve more respect

[CheekyFawn]

I work full time but currently on maternity leave looking after my 5 months old baby and a toddler DS who is 3 yo.
I just don't know where my time goes. Between breastfeeding baby, getting DS ready for preschool and tidying up the house, cooking meals etc, it just feels like there is no time at all even to have 5 mins of coffee break. I feel it was much better when I was at work couple of months ago when DS was in nursery that I used to get at least a lunch break for an hour or 30 mins at least or time between meetings to have a coffee and look at my phone in peace. I imagine this is I think how a day looks for SAHM with young DC and it's bloody hard. Many people just assume they are not doing much but I think they deserve more respect.

I also hope anyone who expects a 50% contribution for their DH with childcare and cleaning similarly does 50% of the heavy gardening, DIY & car maintenance.

My DD is constantly in and out of Homebase and B & Q. She has so far grown up watching me personally scrub down and re-paint 20 fence panels and a gate, treat fresh wood and re-paint a wooden bannister and over front door canopy, use strong chemical to remove and re-paint all exterior window sills, work out myself how to unscrew and repair a loose back door handle, change light bulbs, turn of our water/electricity to diagnose any issues, remove moss from our pathways, do all heavy gardening (pruning huge shrubs and trees in 2 gardens using loppers and saws), thoroughly wash our car, fill our tyres with air, confidently handle garage communications.

She is basically used to seeing me either up a ladder or with a paint brush or screw driver in hand. She will certainly grow up knowing her way round a tool box, car and garden shed.

Now, I have female friends who have very successful careers, who openly tell me that they expect their DHs to fill their cars with petrol, clean them, jet wash their driveways and decking, paint their homes because they are male jobs. Oh the irony! 🤣

I know the format is different I was just wondering what the care model was like as not all women were able to be SAHM.

I don’t envy parents having to balance childrearing and earning money / career success.

It amazes me that doing all the once in a blue moon jobs of DIY / gardening and car maintenance are seen as the equivalent of the daily job of childcare provision!

Personally I don’t have a garden, do my own (basic) DIY and would outsource care maintenance. Same as a lot of the men I know.

And in your friends homes who does most of the domestic labour and childcare?

I do the majority of these tasks weekly. Properly maintaining two large landscaped gardens certainly requires weekly care and attention, I love it.

No, my closest’s friends DH does more childcare and cleaning certainly.

I call out double standards and sexism from women as well as men, a lot of women cherry pick ‘equally doing tasks’ which suit them for sure. Women are perfectly capable of doing all these tasks, I know because I do them 😊

Oh yes lots of people have double standards, like men who want women to do the bulk of domestic / emotional labour and childcare but also want her to earn half the income. (It’s why even when women are the breadwinners they are more likely to do even more of the domestic labour!)

I just have yet to see a house where DIY, car maintenance and gardening needs doing with the same frequency childcare does. Especially not only doing childcare “weekly”.

So it is wrong for a man to say caring for children and cleaning are ‘female’ tasks, but absolutely acceptable for a women to say that DIY and care maintenance are ‘male’ tasks? No, that’s also unacceptable. How on earth will more females be encouraged to be mechanics/painters and decorators/builders/plumbers/electricians with that type of attitude?

There are either inherent gender differences to tasks or all tasks are gender-neutral and hence should be undertaken by both fairly, regardless of frequency…it is illogical and unintelligent to argue otherwise.

I said it’s ok for people to think tasks should be gendered?

Odd I don’t recall saying that. Maybe it shows differently on your screen.

I think couples should decide the split for their homes.

I just laugh at people who always want to reach for the comparison with DIY and car maintenance as if they are done with the same frequency as childcare and other domestic labour.

😂

To be clear:

Some couples are very happy with a gendered division of labour. Mum sorts the kids and cleaning, Dad sorts the finances, DIY and car, etc.

I am talking very specifically about feminist women who are absolutely adamant that a man must do 50% of the childcare and cleaning, but that they themselves do not have to do any of the more traditionally male tasks. I know women like this, and it is very hypocritical! If you both earn the same, split childcare and domestic tasks 50:50 then yes that absolutely should also apply to gardening, DIY and car tasks, unless you outsource the lot.

I never said they are done with the exact same frequency, but if a man is doing his fair share of the childcare and domestic tasks, then why on earth should his wife not take on her fair share of his traditional tasks?

And what about the children whose mother's have returned to work but are doing opposite shifts to Dad so they take turns on looking after the child . Or helpful grandparents There's an in between with stay at home and full time nursery.

And for the person who said that SAHM have well off husbands who pay loads of tax. Ok some might have but others will be with a low earning partner and topped up by benefits

I made cement aged 3 whilst helping my dad build a wall. I could change the oil in a car by 6. I re-wired my house myself aged 19 and decorated every aspect of it. I have done all of the tiling in our house, including 3 slate floors. I laid the oak flooring throughout the downstairs. Fitted 3 new bathrooms and all associated plumbing and 2 kitchen sinks. i own more tools than my husband and do all the car maintenance that doesn’t require a specialist garage.

I don’t enjoy gardening so he tends to do that.

We all make choices. Nobody is forcing women to take up nursery work, carer roles, hairdressing etc.

'As more women enter a profession average pay falls, as more men enter a profession, average pay increases.' Where is your evidence for this? Generally, the way supply and demand works is if more people (regardless of sex) flood into a particular sector this will cause average wages to decrease, as employers can afford to take advantage of the competition. Just as scarcity drives wages up.

'Men in nice comfortable air conditioned offices also outearn women!' Why do you suppose that is? Pure sexism or have you considered there may be other differences aside from gender as to why people may be earning different amounts but still have the same job title? The level of experience a person has, the level of qualification, are they working the same hours, doing the same tasks?

It is illegal to pay a person less simply because of their sex. We have discrimination laws to tackle this. A woman can have her wage benchmarked if she feels she is earnestly being paid less without reason.

Personally, I don't think many companies would even dare to get away with shit like that in todays 'go to the media and take you to court' climate.

Just because women earn less, I'd point out simply being a woman is not necessarily the reason why. Correlation does not imply causation.

You come off it.

Many working women are also receiving benefits.

There have been lots of studies into the gender pay gap.

Two notable findings were that men negotiate salary harder when joining a new employer (probably having been socialised to value their worth financially out of the home) and that men are more likely to apply for roles for which they don’t have all of the required skills and experience. Confidence in interview persuades interviewer panels they can do the role. Women don’t generally apply for roles for which they don’t meet the criteria and so limit their progression. Likely explained by socialisation rather than hormones and chromosomes.

Now that’s practising what you preach! You have an extremely impressive and useful skill set 🙌🏻

Yes but that's irrelevant to the comment of having said that rich husbands are paying for

And what of the other important factors I have mentioned that don't rely on a hypothesis of meek women being socialised into not speaking up. I'd say being a pushover is largely to do with upbringing and individual personality over sex.

Even if your explanation does factor into it, that falls on women themselves!

Basically, if you allow yourself to be overlooked that is exactly what will happen. I worked with an incredibly shy, quiet man who wasn't unintelligent or capable, but he was earning less than anyone on the team because he was happy to plod along in his role and wasn't a proactive person. He wouldn't speak up in meetings etc. Whilst I was outspoken and regularly asked for pay rises. Effectively, he was a bit of 'pussy' to put it plainly and it kept him stagnant in his career.

I completely concur with your point about confidence.

One example- comparing 2 Head Teachers I know. The male one- unshakable confidence, avoids answering questions better than any politician, highly defensive, highly resistant to external advice from anybody, replying to emails was beneath him, etc.

The female one- far more conscientious, far better people skills, far less rude, thoughtful, self-reflective, respectful of advice and intelligent enough to consider alternative viewpoints, but still confident in her own opinions…far, far better data results. She was stunned recently to discover the male Head took a day at home each week and refused to attend things in his own time after school. She does everything to the highest standard all the time, zero shortcuts, as women are held to higher standards.

In my opinion, she is the far better Head and boss in many ways, but I bet he would out talk her into a role based on bluster! It is infuriating.

Not really. I made that comment off the back of someone suggesting SAHMs being economically inactive was a problem. I pointed out that many SAHMs have rich husbands who pay enormous amounts of tax so it doesn't matter if their wives aren't contributing to tax.

I have worked. Now I don't. And I don't feel bad in the slightest as my DHs contributions more than cover any type of burden I could possibly be to society.

I appreciate some SAHMs may well be receiving benefits, but many working women with partners are also receiving the same, many single parents require help too.

@MerlinsBeard1

As more women enter a profession average pay falls, as more men enter a profession, average pay increases.' Where is your evidence for this? Generally, the way supply and demand works is if more people (regardless of sex) flood into a particular sector this will cause average wages to decrease, as employers can afford to take advantage of the competition. Just as scarcity drives wages up.

https://www.nytimes.com/2016/03/20/upshot/as-women-take-over-a-male-dominated-field-the-pay-drops.html

https://www.payscale.com/career-advice/when-an-occupation-becomes-female-dominated-pay-declines/#:~:text=Researchers%20analyzed%2050%20years%20of,that%20women's%20work%20is%20undervalued.

Also works in reverse. When an industry moves from female dominated to male dominated (such such as computer programming) average pay and prestige increases

www.weforum.org/stories/2016/04/the-simple-reason-for-the-gender-pay-gap-work-done-by-women-is-still-valued-less/#:~:text=She's%20not%20just%20saying%20this,the%20New%20York%20Times%20writes.

“She’s not just saying this based on a hunch: along with Paul Allison of the University of Pennsylvania and Asaf Levanon of the University of Haifa, England has carried out one of the most exhaustive studies on the issue. Their findings suggest that women are not necessarily kept out of or choose not to enter high-paying and prestigious professions. Instead, when a job is dominated by women, it’s just not seen as important, and therefore pays less, even if it requires the same skills and education. The New York Times uses the example of janitors versus maids, jobs that are identical in every aspect except gender composition – and pay.”

And as women start moving into traditionally male-dominated positions, the pay falls: “A 10% increase in proportion female is associated with .5% to 5% percent decrease in hourly wage in each decade,” the three researchers found.
The world of computer programming is the perfect example. Historically a female-dominated field, men started to take over in the 1980s. And as they did, things changed: “When male programmers began to outnumber female ones, the job began paying more and gained prestige,” Claire Cain Miller of the New York Times writes.“

Interestingly, the gender remains within industries. Men in low paid “female industries” outearn women in those industries. Male nurses earn more than female nurses, male teachers earn more than female teachers

https://www.fastcompany.com/3044753/the-other-wage-gap-why-men-in-women-dominated-industries-still-earn-more

Apparently the same is true with the medical profession in Russia.

To be clear I think a lot of people over simplify the gender earnings gap - but across the board. A gender earnings gap is not in and of itself indicative of willfull discrimination. I am proud my company conducts pay audits and examined whether we have any “unexplained pay gaps” on gender but also ethnicity and corrects accordingly. I think more places should do that.

I just find it interesting how little people stop to ask why anything female coded except industries where they are objectified, are seen as less value. I can easily see why a surgeon would earn more than a childcare worker. But flummoxed as to why maids and janitors are viewed so differently.

Teachers pay has decreased probably at the same rate as the proportion of females has increased.
Junior doctors pay has decreased as the proportion of females as increased.
Train drivers pay meanwhile increases.

That looks to be an American study.

American daycares are quite different to British nurseries.

I would like to see men have paternity leave that is longer than 2 weeks, that's just pathetic. I'd love to see at least 6 weeks but ideally more which would be a step forward when it comes to equality because it is so easy for the woman to get into the habit of doing everything on maternity leave and often it doesn't change, even if she does go back to work.

I think the issue with shared leave is that most mothers simply don't want to share.