Sorry to resurrect this thread but I've been out all day and wanted to respond to what blueshoes said earlier.
"As you have just said, your own position is far from ideal. (?Among adults, the strongest predictor in both men and women of an individual?s altruism ? the ability to care for others - is the level of care taken by the father in their childhood.?) to outweigh the negative impact on all of you of your husband?s long hours?
My husband does do long hours during the week, like most professional men in their 30's I know. The kids are late to bed and late to rise so they a couple of hours with DH in the evening most nights, even if he is late back. How much time do you get with your little ones between getting back from work and putting them to bed? Two hours is pretty good I'd say. Luckily he also engages so fully with them in the time that he IS at home that they have a very close relationship. I've been the subject of a lot of envy from my friends over dh's brilliance with his kids. He also has them completely to himself for at least 3 full days a month plus one or two evenings a week, as I work at these times, so this is good. He comes from a long line of brilliant dads. His own dad worked double shifts for 20 years when he was growing up - he came here from the West Indies to work for British rail and needed to do this to keep his family. When he was little DP saw very little of his dad during the week, because the length of hours that FIL worked, but they have always had a very loving and tender relationship. But yes - it is a bugger that so many children have dads that work such long hours. Perhaps if more parents knew about the possible impact of a father working long hours on their children there would be more political pressure to change working practices in the UK.
On the other hand you might get the sort of responses you've seen here to discussion of the research findings about nursery care: lots of scepticism ("how can this research take everything into account - it's a load of rubbish") and defensiveness ("are you trying to make me feel bad about the fact my dp works such long hours - what do you suggest we do!") so perhaps there wouldn't be much point.
Wanted to say - I do find it quite interesting the way you see things blueshoes. Your comment about me spending 'vast amount of time' with my dc's, and saying that maybe I think "not going to full time childcare will have a positive enough effect on your children" suggests to me that you see having your babies looked after by other people full time while you work is somehow the parenting 'default' mode, while caring for your babies yourself is some sort of luxury indulgence or optional extra for posh people. I looked after my babies myself because I didn't want to be separated from them, and because I could - simple as that. I also (now) think it probably made their first few years happier and less stressfull.
"And to suggest that one compromise is more damaging than another is naïve at best and downright insulting at worst"
That sounds good but is nonsense really. It's not at all naive or insulting, it's perfectly rational. I don't for one minute think that my dc's getting 10 hours less in DH's company from Monday to Friday than I'd ideally like would have remotely the impact on their experience of very early childhood as them spending 50 hours a week away from either of us in group care - effectively spending the majority of their waking hours for the first 3 years of their life in the care of people I personally know very little about.
The first is a minor compromise; the other would be a completely different way of life for all of us, but most of all for our children.