What careers let you earn lots of money without working full time?

[mousiemousie]

Just wondering which careers are best to advise young girls to go for if they want to earn good money without working full time whilst they have a young family...

...any suggestions?

Oh In reply to the OP - If your job isn't flexible, marry someone who's job is

I know I know I've put feminisim back years by saying that but the fact of the matter is that I can only really do my job (even PT) because dh has a flexible job in academia and he often takes up the slack. I would find my job pretty impossible to do with a child if I were a single parent or with someone who had a traditional 5 days a week with long hours in the office type job.

Lazycow, that's what men have been doing for years V feminist point, actually, that it's not just our responsibility to put our careers on hold on account of our reproductive capacity.

I can only echo what tigermoth and others have said re. freelancing - I work freelance as a legal translator, and whilst the money is ok (so it should be - it's a very specialised thing and requires a post-grad qualification really) it is so unpredictable and precarious, I'd hate to be the main breadwinner. Personally, I feel that I am only able to do this because dh earns enough to support us all, what I earn is 'extra' really. It is also difficult to juggle holidays and work without losing customers.

It's not really the point of this thread but I work full-time, but three days in the office and two days at home. Being organised used to mean I often got everything done in the three days I'm in, although less so these days since a pesky reorganisation. But it seems to me that people who work say 4 days a week often end up with effectively a full-time job for 4/5ths pay, and I wanted to avoid that.

It's a bit of a sexist thread. Why are you assuming young girls and not young boys will be the ones at home looking after children? It should be a sexually neutral issue in 2006.

I suppose it's accountants I know who've opened their own practices from home a few days week that are fairly well paid for part time. My dentist works part time. I know a lady who makes a lot from share dealing at home part time. Others buy a string of properties they manage and let out which can be part time. I think the higher earners are those who set up and then sell businesses although it can be harder to do that part time.

Agree geekgrrl - I wouldn't want to be in my position but as main breadwinner. Far too precarious.

Agree with lazycow re qual vs quant - I do 95% qual and 5% quant. I think I only get quant from my main client because I was senior when I was there and they know I know what I'm doing - it's not risky for them.

Xenia makes some valid points, but the biology ain't goint to change any time soon. Indeed, the effect of legistlation to "protect" child bearing women now produces a path that makes it easier for many simply to leave the workforce altogether.
That's why we seem to see greater job diversity and more entrepreneurial activity from women these days.

Both political parties have the sort of policies you get when 2nd rate accountants explain economics to history graduates who've never had a proper job.
(The tales I could tell of government ministers who simply can't understand basic mathematics...).

Fact is that because of rising car and safety standards, childcare is now vastly more expensive.
For a large % of women, it simply cannot be made economically viable for them to work.

The hole is education. Girls choose dumber subjects at school and university, and when they need to reskill, there simply is not the adult education facilities for them to get back up to a level that makes them employable in a decent job.
It's not politically viable to ditch the folk singing and knitting crap that girls get fed as teenagers, but adult education is a pathetically cheap way of giving women the power in the labour market they need.
That means book keeping/accountancy, Excel, and lots of things that simply don't equate to the Urdu, French, and yet more knitting and folk singing that the system currently provides.

I'm in the US, so don't know the comparative salary, but I have found that my career as an optometrist has worked out really well in conjunction with having children. I work 2 1/2 days a week and pick up extra days when other docs go on holidays. There's no problem with the male/female wage gap either.

I'm a hospital doctor,( consultant psychiatrist ), the pay is good but you do have to work hard....increasing your earnings is always possible by expanding the private work you do, this can really bump things up. I don't do much because have 5 LOs. Also try to put off babies until you're well on the way to consultant,otherwise you may not get there..