"I'm lucky that I don't have to work"

[AnnieLobeseder]

I was having a discussion on Facebook today about bread machines and cleaners with some women, most of whom I don't know since they're 'friends of friends'.

One woman, who seems to be older than me, maybe late 40s, early 50s, said, "I hand-bake my bread and don't need a cleaner, but then I'm lucky that I don't have to work."

So, this made me want to reply that technically I don't have to either, but I choose to for many reasons including my sanity and the fact that I love my job. But since I don't know her I decided it wasn't the time for an arugument!

But now I'm wondering...

1. Is there a general assumption that women only work when they have to in the older generation? Or perhaps in our generation too? Do people still really believe a women should stay home unless there's a pressing financial need?

2. Am I seeing sexism where there isn't any; perhaps she thinks that no-one, male or female would work if they didn't absolutely have to, because she's never had a fulfilling job?

Any thoughts?

Ha ha Annie. Just clicked on your profile. I have been looking at properties in your town today .

I think it is a lucky position if someone is in the position, esp financially, to chose if they want to work or not.

Dammit SGM, if it wasn't a completely outdated patriarchal institution, I'd ask you to marry me.

namemy - cool! Give me a shout if you move in. Are you anywhere nearby now?

SGM - I did just stay that SAHPs work for their families. Though the lady in question was old enough that her children were sure to have left home, so her time probably was more her own.

Oh, and financially I do not have to work. However I do work. I don't work int he capacity I ought to based on my qualifications. Instead I chose to do a job that pays much less but gives me a better home work balance. I like the additional extras, the luxuries, that me working brings, such as the extra holidays or weekends away.

I do feel lucky in that I am abe to make that chose.

Exactly. Feminism practically goes out the window when making the decision whether to work or not.

It comes down to:

how much does my partner earn
can I afford childcare while at work
how many hours is partner at work

etc etc all economic and practical factors.

I think anyone who works is incredibly lucky. Financial independence, freedom that having your own money brings, a pension fund.

Oh dear, this is turning into a SAHM vs WOHM debate, isn't it, with all the women on both sides desperately explaining their situation and justifying why it works for them.

I was hoping for a more of a debate on society's view in general.

Maisie - think that would depend how much the person was earning though, and how their household finances work.

I know that the little amount I earn these days goes nowhere in terms of our household expenses. It doesn't even go anywhere to covering our mortgages.

Firstly I would like to point out that staying at home and looking after young children IS work, in fact some people even get paid for it.

Secondly, I think it is less lucky to be a SAHM than to have the CHOICE of being a SAHM or a WOHM.

I think if I had an exciting job that I invested years of training in, like a doctor, and I could work part time and still have decent status and career progression then I dare say I wouldn't have considered staying at home. Or if my salary was 40% or something, but it wasn't, in fact it contributed only to my commuter life and flat elsewhere...so for me it was a no brainer and then I was pg when my first was six months and now have four!!

However after eight years of being at home I now have fingers in a couple of pies....nice shop has agreed to stock my children's winter coats and may have a buyer for my all singing all dancing sales/appraisal software!!

Well as a society I think firstly most people, naturally, value choice.

Having said that I am not sure that all things being financially equal most people would continue to work if they didn't have to.

Hand on heart those of you who do work would you continue to do so if you received your same salary (along with opportuniites for pay rises etc) and pension for not going into work?

My mum doesnt work now and her kids have moved out. I think its the perfect life lunches out, trips places, fun every day. If I can do that when I am older I will be chuffed to bits but doubt I will ever be that well off. My mum had a very fulfilling job but said she did it for 34 years and it was time to have fun. I think that is what a lot of people think when they get older.

Up to a point Hula - but if you're out of the job market, you have no financial independence regardless of what you earn, and that for me is a feminist issue. If a woman is not working and has no young children, as in the case of the OP's example, then she is dependent on her DH for her livelihood - unless of course she has independent means. Too many women of my mother's generation have found themselves royally shafted when the lifestyle that they thought they had, and considered themselves 'lucky' to have has disappeared along with the husband, either through bereavement or divorce. I would absolutely hate to be dependent on DH for my livelihood or lifestyle - certainly wouldn't consider myself lucky.

Surely being in a position to choose whether you work or not is very lucky - we live in a society where most people have no choice but to work, often in jobs they don't like.

My DP was very lucky not to have to work for a while as I financially supported him while he pursued a creative venture.

Ah, it has struck me why the phasing bothered me (going back to the OP)... by saying that you're lucky to be in your position, rather than the other person's, you're implying that yours is the superior position, not so?

I don't go around saying, "I'm lucky to be a biologist," (though I feel that I am) - I just say, "I'm a biologist" as a neutral statement of fact.

So, to rephrase my question, was the women saying that she feels her situation of not working is superior to my situation of working, or that she personally is lucky to be in a situation that pleases her?

Going by the way most of you have responded, I shall choose to believe the latter. Though I hope you can see why the former might have been inferred.

i'm lucky that i have a job, of course, if DH had his old job still, i'd be even luckier because i wouldn't have to have a job.

but i still have work to do whatever.

i think society puts a higher value on paid workj than typically female parenting work...

"Hand on heart those of you who do work would you continue to do so if you received your same salary (along with opportuniites for pay rises etc) and pension for not going into work?"

I would stay home if I could pursue my own interests, certainly.

If I had to clean the house, cook, do laundry, ferry kids about and have very little of my own time, I'd rather be at work, thanks!

maisie but is very difficult to isolate the issues isn't it? Whilst many woman are shafted by their husbands leaving (I'm not sure about dying most seem to be financially better off in those circumstances) they have had the previous "benefit" of their earlier choices.

It is always something of a gamble: If DH leaves me finacially screwed at some point in the future I will remian grateful that I have had a fantastic few years not having to work.

Would I rather give up something that I have enjoyed enormously because things may go potentially wrong in the future. No way.

Would I like to have the opportunity to not work and be finacially independently, secure? yes of course. But that isn't going to happen (unless I win that £82 million!)

So like everything in life it is a compromise.

Actually the implication of being a SAHM is that you can't get a job and so people preface it with 'I'm lucky....' implying that they're not unemployed living in a shithole. It's instant justification for their, usually sneered at, choice.

This isn't a feminist issue - unless you're one of the lucky few with a vocation and a job you find rewarding and challenging, I think most people would rather not work.

I think I'm lucky that I don't have to work - as in financially, it's not imperative that I am in paid employment. We're lucky that that's the case - bloody lucky. . Possibly though, my sense of luck is because I've always, in the past, worked to live rather than lived to work - I've never had a strong sense of vocation and still don't know what I want to be when I grow up. My DH, however, does - he's also very lucky.

And please don't describe women in their late forties as being "in the older generation". It makes me want to weep. Stop rubbing it in.

Annie point taken, but if you make a "career" out of staying at home then the part when you have no time to yourself is actually very small - I look on it as akin to the crappy training part of a job where you work your arse off, get no credit and rubbish pay, but you know in time the rewards will be great.

I have done the no time two under two hand the kids to DH as he walks in through the door and now DC are at school I have pretty much 5 hours a day to do as I please.

Only I runined it by getting pregnant againg !!