Incentives for SAHMs - anyone read Fiona Phillips today?

[bohemianbint]

Link here

I think if you can get past the slightly guilt-inducing title, what she is basically saying is quite interesting. It's the first thing I've read in a while that doesn't write SAHMs off as useless bovine idiots.

Obviously don't want to start the old fight of working vs sahm, but what do we think about some kind of incentive for mums to stay at home?

FWIW I have recently become a SAHM by accident after stupid sexist boss forced me out of my job - I am taking him to a tribunal. I am looking for work but am pregnant so not sure how that'll go down with potential employers! I'd like to work PT ideally but I feel really under pressure from everyone around me to get a job and stop being a "boring" SAHM.

ignore them
my you ngest started school in september. everyone was after em all last year to get a job. now they ahave figured out i will do it when i want to . not when they think i should.

It's a shame that people can't just do what's right for them without passing judgement on everyone else's lives, isn't it?

not going to happen. The prevailing incentives all seem to be geared towards going out to work. Being a SAHM is a 'lifestyle' choice etc.

the thing that's dawned on me since getting pregnant with second child, is that I actually won't have a choice in the matter.

The cost of childcare for 2 children is prohibitive - if my old job had stayed the same it wouldn't have been such a problem, but I am unlikely to find another job that paid as well now.

Doesn't Sweden do this? I think they have found it very successful. I think that if the Gov. is willing to help working mothers pay for childcare then they should also help mothers or fathers who wish to stay at home.

Thing is, the contribution to childcare is rubbish! We're not really well off and we only qualified for about £4 per month.

Scandinavia seem to get an awful lot right eh?

Whatever your views on WOHM/SAHM, this is a very dubious article. The whole argument is centred around the quote:
'From a child's perspective, nature dictates that Mummy is the centre of their world until the end of primary school.' Well excuse me, but who says so? Where's the evidence to back this up? What's the magic cut-off at the end of Primary school? Why is it a good idea for any child to think they're the centre of the world? Sorry, just too many assumptions going on here. Very Daily Mirror journalism. This subject deserves better than that.

I am a working mum - but I agree that there should be incentives for stay at home mums and also that they should be praised for doing a difficult 'job! To be honest though all mums do a difficult 'job' whether stay at home mums, part time working mums or full time working mums and sometimes the decision is not always down to personal choice.

Inthegutter - I think that's the only part of the article I find a bit dubious.
For the rest of it, I think it's very good, at the very least by making us question why it's a good idea to get children into paid childcare as quickly as possible and what the effects on them of this might be.

I think it's good to question that too, juuule.

Can't see the point of pushing women into low-paid jobs so they have to spend pretty well all their wages on childcare. Esp. if they are forced to pay for low-cost, low-quality childcare. How does the child benefit?

I don't think anyone would say that low quality care benefits a child - whether it's paid care or what they get at home. I'm sure the starting point for us all is that children need to be nurtured in a secure, stimulating and loving environment where they are able to build positive relationships with others. These are the building blocks to a happy child and a happy adult I'd have thought. I would hate to be stuck in a low paid, low status job. That was one of my motivations to achieve well at school, go on to higher education etc.
This is a huge issue with no easy answers. However, a return to the bad old days when girls weren't expected to get too much of an education, but instead were expected to do a dead end job for a few years before marrying and having kids is definitely NOT a solution.

I don't think the article said that was a solution or did I miss something.

I have heard here on Mumsnet of a mother questioning whether she should stay in her job as once she has worked her 40+ hours travelled 2 hours a day, picked child up from nursery, she has a grand total of £50 per week or month profit. Why is she working like that. She could get a partime job and partime childcare and still be better off with much more contact with her child.

Depends whether she is trying to keep a career going or whether she prefers to work full-time.

The trick is to facillitate choice, not make either out to be the right one. There's lots of Mums couldn't imagine (or simply couldn't) working with tinies- and a great deal who'd hate being at home all day. That's regardless of educational attainment etc- for plenty of people its the social life they have that keeps them sane for example, and that can as easily be based in the factory canteen, House of Commons Restaurant or Mother and Toddlers Group.

Went slowly barmy at home with ds1, but after 3 kids it wasn't an option- partly for Sn reasons, but just childcare costs, trying to have a relationship with DH (who works shifts) etc. Uni is working as a middle road atm, but for the first year after this babya rrives i won't even consider working- after that though i'll need to and Dh will study and take responsibility for childcare. That's the sort of flexibility people need i think.

Exactly, Peachy. Parents should be supported whether they choose to work outside the home full or part time, or stay at home, or work from home, whatever. Raising children isn't solely the business of the parents, it benefits society as a whole if we have secure, well adjusted kids. Help with childcare for working parents AND help with the costs for SAHMs/dads.

Have they brought in the thing about a non-working parent being able to transfer their tax free allowance to the other parent, yet? Or are they still just talking about it? It'd be a start...

juuule - no the article didn't suggest that as a solution. I doesn't attempt to offer any solutions except some kind of 'payment' for staying at home which it doesn't really explain.However, as I pointed out, the article centres wholly around the idea that children want their mums (yes, mums, not even 'a parent'!) to stay at home until the end of primary school! And I just find that a huge assumption to make. Many women (and men) enjoy working and their career is important to them. Many wouldn't be suited to being at home 24/7. Some people do, some don't. That's all. And this article doesn't argue about choice. It assumes that we would all be better off by keeping women out of the workplace.

Link to the Times

The above link to today's Times has another article that goes into Belsky's research a bit more. I suspect that the reason for mothers to stay home until until the children are in primary school(although it doesn't say so) is to do with children who have been in nursery adversely affecting the behaviour of other children in school and that the effects of this will go on for several years.

Regardless of all this, I do think that women should be given assistance to stay at home if that is what they want. Anything that gives us more real choices has got to be a good thing.

The fact that the article appears to focus a bit too much on 'only mum will do' shouldn't take away from the fact that the whole issue of seemingly rushing children into nurseries,etc is becoming more the accepted way to go,even though there is some evidence to show that it doesn't benefit all children. Sometimes to the point of it seeming a bit odd to some people that a parent (and it doesn't matter which one) would prefer to be the main carer for their children in their early years. Or worse than that, some are viewed as if they use it just to avoid 'working'.

Or worse than that, some are viewed as if they use it just to avoid 'working'.

-------

quoted for truth. Grr.

Absolutely agree that the choice should be for either parent.

Well there is already a cash incentive for a parent to stay at home. It's called 'benefit' and it's what you get when you can't get a job that pays enough to cover childcare. Is it somehow magically supposed to not make you a lazy, scrounging, workshy parasite who sponges off taxpayers if you;re middle class and they give the payment a different name?

Well there you go. A perfect example of how a parent who decides to care for their own child is viewed. Thank you Madamez.

Juule: sorry I don't think I made myself clear. I have every sympathy with the parent who remains on benefit because there are no jobs available that will cover the cost of childcare (or because he/she would rather care for his/her own children), and I think that paying a state allowance to parents to enable them to care for their children is a good idea. What annoys me is that the parent in the first position is so often called lazy, workshy etc by the same people who are clamouring for payments to be made to SAHP.