7 ms·

A big problem is two income families. It's always struck me as odd that folks think they could give parenting their divided attention and then honestly claim th

A big problem is two income families. It's always struck me as odd that folks think they could give parenting their divided attention and then honestly claim they've given their best effort. Our culture was hoodwinked into thinking raising children was somehow less important than having a career. Child rearing is a full time job if performed optimally and it's importance should be recognized and championed.

oppositelock 10y ago
My wife and I both work, and we have kids. It's not because of any relative importance of career versus kids, it's simply because we couldn't afford to live here in the SF Bay Area otherwise. It would be wonderful if one of us could stay home, but there's more to it than that as well. Have you ever spent all day with toddlers? It's enough to make you go mad sometimes, and it also starves you of adult interaction. Chasing little wild humans and occasionally commanding, "No! Spit that out!" isn't really interaction. You need a support system when raising kids. Traditionally, this has been family, but people move around for work so much in the US, that many of us don't have that support system, and we outsource that to professionals - day care, nannies, co-ops. All that stuff costs money, and so, we both have to work.
- chrisper 10y ago
  The questions I am about to ask are not meant to judge you. I am asking, because I am pretty sure you asked yourself these as well and I am just curious about your answers. If you both are so busy and "barley" (not homeless barley, but like needing dual-income) can afford living in the SF Bay Area, then why have kids? Similarly, why live in the SF Bay Area?
  - oppositelock 10y ago
    The bay area is very expensive and it takes an exceptional single income to live comfortably, or you make huge compromises, so I think dual income families are far more common that not. When it comes to having children, at some point, you decide you're ready and find a way to make it work. We're managing, but we both have to work. We love the area, our friends are here, are careers are here, we're up in the mountains every few weeks enjoying nature, this really is a beautiful part of the country, and you pay for that. Life isn't only about minimizing costs. Long term, we probably can't afford to stay here unless I win the startup lottery, so we have an exit plan, but for now, we're enjoying this place.
  - sidlls 10y ago
    Employment, just the same as anywhere else. In this country a job isn't something that most people can simply pick and choose from. Tech jobs especially are very different outside the Bay Area. A big example: it's common to have 18-30 month tenures at a job in the Bay Area, and that's considered "job hopping" many other places. Others include the casual dress and relatively greater time flexibility. Tech experience in the Bay by no means guarantees the ability to find employment outside it.
    - chrisper 10y ago
      I guess, I also foolishly assumed that both are in tech. Thanks for your input.
distances 10y ago
I think blaming "career culture" isn't correct here. Two working parents has been the norm in Northern European countries for quite a long time now (usually due to necessity rather than because of a career), and they are still often ranked as the best places to raise a kid.
- brudgers 10y ago
  It's been the norm in the US as well. There was a time when it was more common for middle class Americans to have a stay at home parent, but it was never the most common case among all Americans {1}. It is only in the last several decades that parents have been demonized for not having a non-working parent (and this as real wages have been reduced for most people), but historically, the American family did not just have working moms but working kids (on the farm, baby sitting, running a paper route or as with my great grandmother in the button factor at age eight). {1}: https://www.census.gov/hhes/families/files/ASA2010_Kreider_Elliott.pdf https://www.census.gov/hhes/families/files/ASA2010_Kreider_E...
  - larrywright 10y ago
    This largely depends on where you live. In urban areas, I think two working parents is the norm. In rural areas, one parent staying at home is a lot more common. Cost of living is a big part of that, for sure.d
boulos 10y ago
As I have American ex-pat friends living in Paris with a young child, I can tell you that the main difference is support from society. Replicating socialized daycare on your own is massively inefficient (often one or two children max per caretaker) and really challenging financially. Instead of paying for child care over the course of say 10-12 years, many countries in Europe effectively spread that out over your entire working life (40 or so years) via taxation. Clearly the American way needs to get someone a Child-Care Bond or Annuity or something...
slizard 10y ago
The real problem starts with the idea/wording of "one / two income family". It trivializes the issue and is likely rooted in the dated "housewife" concept that forces people into a permanent role, dependence, and general lack of choice, a social structure that really needs reform (and has been to a great extent in many countries). Why can't parents work (earn) and take care of their kids at the same time? Why assign a (permanent) role of stay-at-home-parent to essentially half of the adults (with children) risking unnecessarily trapping them in roles and financial state that's unfair.
- mjevans 10y ago
  I would speculate that it is lack of sufficient competition in the market. Therefore the cost of living for single workers in single worker dwellings raises to eliminate any surplus. Most larger dwellings are similarly set by the price that can be afforded by two full time adult workers. This leaves no room for reduced time workers, such as two adults with jobs that allow them to work within the hours that children are typically in public daycare (warehousing in schools). It also doesn't help anyone that the building codes are very lousy at requiring sufficient acoustic isolation. I'd sure like to not be woken up early / kept up late by the noises of those in other units.
- artpepper 10y ago
  Because the U.S. has evolved a model where childcare is very expensive and people are expected to work > 40 hours per week. We need public pre-K and a 30- to 40-hour workweek.
hesdeadjim 10y ago
That dream was 50's nuclear family hoodwinking based on the sexism at the time and the woman's "place" in the home. My child goes to daycare and it is infinitely more stimulating than anything we could do for her at home even if we've "given our best effort". What is the spouse who stays home supposed to do in ten years when the child is much more independent and at school or activities much of the day? He or she has to either start a career or go to school and then face the ageism for entry level positions. And what are two spouses supposed to do when they both deeply enjoy their work and the value it brings them as individuals? My wife was home with the child for 5 months before getting back into the workforce and she complained frequently about the loss of identity. The real problem and solution, as other posters have mentioned, is a strong support structure from friends and family. We live in a wonderful area of Colorado, but all of our family is on the east coast or in Germany and it just isn't going to happen that we move closer. So we struggle and get by, but having a parent stay home to be daycare full time wouldn't serve either of us.
- Kenji 10y ago
  "My wife was home with the child for 5 months before getting back into the workforce and she complained frequently about the loss of identity." I am sorry to say, If you lose your identity after taking care of a kid for 5 months, you didn't have much identity to begin with.
  - mixedCase 10y ago
    The opposite is most likely to be true, as someone with nothing going on in their lives may welcome the activity.
  - hesdeadjim 10y ago
    Wow man that's a pretty fucked up thing to say. The anonymity of the internet is a wonderful place for trolls and cowards isn't it?
    - Nomentatus 10y ago
      Here, substitute "identity" for friends, contacts, clubs, connections. If you vanished for five months, and then could only return once in a while, how many friends and solid connections would you have that you could really rely on? Now try five years! The answer, almost everyone finds out is very, very few. Being gone means you weren't useful to them for a long time, and that's what counts, for nearly everyone. What the elderly find out over decades about how shallow and self-serving most human contact is, you get to find out much faster. So, if your connections in a city are only five years old, and you then have a child and start to care for that child full-time - you're probably going to find out that indeed you really didn't have much of an "identity" in that town, after all. I admit it's a bit perverse (and not very zen) to equate personal identity and social contacts. But we all do - we are social creatures. When I was a teenager and my elders were saying "he hasn't found his identity yet" they precisely meant "role, group he identifies with." It took me forever to figure out that's what they meant. I still think that's a bit or more than a bit screwed-up, but it is how we conduct ourselves. Not necessarily how we should conduct ourselves, or how an enlightened Zen master would conduct themselves. So I would count the first poster whose contribution is now greyed-out as naive and unsympathetic, rather than as deliberately abusive or trolling.
xkcd-sucks 10y ago
Childcare by grandparents is pretty common outside of the USA, often in places where both parents genuinely need to work
- dsfyu404ed 10y ago
  It's also fairly common in the US for "poor" people.
  - wutbrodo 10y ago
    I don't really get why it's not more common for all people: I have a cousin who's probably in the 99th percentile for household income and his mom helps out with his two very young kids a LOT.

oppositelock 10y ago

My wife and I both work, and we have kids. It's not because of any relative importance of career versus kids, it's simply because we couldn't afford to live here in the SF Bay Area otherwise. It would be wonderful if one of us could stay home, but there's more to it than that as well. Have you ever spent all day with toddlers? It's enough to make you go mad sometimes, and it also starves you of adult interaction. Chasing little wild humans and occasionally commanding, "No! Spit that out!" isn't really interaction. You need a support system when raising kids. Traditionally, this has been family, but people move around for work so much in the US, that many of us don't have that support system, and we outsource that to professionals - day care, nannies, co-ops. All that stuff costs money, and so, we both have to work.

chrisper 10y ago
The questions I am about to ask are not meant to judge you. I am asking, because I am pretty sure you asked yourself these as well and I am just curious about your answers. If you both are so busy and "barley" (not homeless barley, but like needing dual-income) can afford living in the SF Bay Area, then why have kids? Similarly, why live in the SF Bay Area?
- oppositelock 10y ago
  The bay area is very expensive and it takes an exceptional single income to live comfortably, or you make huge compromises, so I think dual income families are far more common that not. When it comes to having children, at some point, you decide you're ready and find a way to make it work. We're managing, but we both have to work. We love the area, our friends are here, are careers are here, we're up in the mountains every few weeks enjoying nature, this really is a beautiful part of the country, and you pay for that. Life isn't only about minimizing costs. Long term, we probably can't afford to stay here unless I win the startup lottery, so we have an exit plan, but for now, we're enjoying this place.
- sidlls 10y ago
  Employment, just the same as anywhere else. In this country a job isn't something that most people can simply pick and choose from. Tech jobs especially are very different outside the Bay Area. A big example: it's common to have 18-30 month tenures at a job in the Bay Area, and that's considered "job hopping" many other places. Others include the casual dress and relatively greater time flexibility. Tech experience in the Bay by no means guarantees the ability to find employment outside it.
  - chrisper 10y ago
    I guess, I also foolishly assumed that both are in tech. Thanks for your input.

distances 10y ago

I think blaming "career culture" isn't correct here. Two working parents has been the norm in Northern European countries for quite a long time now (usually due to necessity rather than because of a career), and they are still often ranked as the best places to raise a kid.

brudgers 10y ago
It's been the norm in the US as well. There was a time when it was more common for middle class Americans to have a stay at home parent, but it was never the most common case among all Americans {1}. It is only in the last several decades that parents have been demonized for not having a non-working parent (and this as real wages have been reduced for most people), but historically, the American family did not just have working moms but working kids (on the farm, baby sitting, running a paper route or as with my great grandmother in the button factor at age eight). {1}: https://www.census.gov/hhes/families/files/ASA2010_Kreider_Elliott.pdf https://www.census.gov/hhes/families/files/ASA2010_Kreider_E...
- larrywright 10y ago
  This largely depends on where you live. In urban areas, I think two working parents is the norm. In rural areas, one parent staying at home is a lot more common. Cost of living is a big part of that, for sure.d

boulos 10y ago

As I have American ex-pat friends living in Paris with a young child, I can tell you that the main difference is support from society. Replicating socialized daycare on your own is massively inefficient (often one or two children max per caretaker) and really challenging financially. Instead of paying for child care over the course of say 10-12 years, many countries in Europe effectively spread that out over your entire working life (40 or so years) via taxation. Clearly the American way needs to get someone a Child-Care Bond or Annuity or something...

slizard 10y ago

The real problem starts with the idea/wording of "one / two income family". It trivializes the issue and is likely rooted in the dated "housewife" concept that forces people into a permanent role, dependence, and general lack of choice, a social structure that really needs reform (and has been to a great extent in many countries). Why can't parents work (earn) and take care of their kids at the same time? Why assign a (permanent) role of stay-at-home-parent to essentially half of the adults (with children) risking unnecessarily trapping them in roles and financial state that's unfair.

mjevans 10y ago
I would speculate that it is lack of sufficient competition in the market. Therefore the cost of living for single workers in single worker dwellings raises to eliminate any surplus. Most larger dwellings are similarly set by the price that can be afforded by two full time adult workers. This leaves no room for reduced time workers, such as two adults with jobs that allow them to work within the hours that children are typically in public daycare (warehousing in schools). It also doesn't help anyone that the building codes are very lousy at requiring sufficient acoustic isolation. I'd sure like to not be woken up early / kept up late by the noises of those in other units.
artpepper 10y ago
Because the U.S. has evolved a model where childcare is very expensive and people are expected to work > 40 hours per week. We need public pre-K and a 30- to 40-hour workweek.

hesdeadjim 10y ago

That dream was 50's nuclear family hoodwinking based on the sexism at the time and the woman's "place" in the home. My child goes to daycare and it is infinitely more stimulating than anything we could do for her at home even if we've "given our best effort". What is the spouse who stays home supposed to do in ten years when the child is much more independent and at school or activities much of the day? He or she has to either start a career or go to school and then face the ageism for entry level positions. And what are two spouses supposed to do when they both deeply enjoy their work and the value it brings them as individuals? My wife was home with the child for 5 months before getting back into the workforce and she complained frequently about the loss of identity. The real problem and solution, as other posters have mentioned, is a strong support structure from friends and family. We live in a wonderful area of Colorado, but all of our family is on the east coast or in Germany and it just isn't going to happen that we move closer. So we struggle and get by, but having a parent stay home to be daycare full time wouldn't serve either of us.

Kenji 10y ago
"My wife was home with the child for 5 months before getting back into the workforce and she complained frequently about the loss of identity." I am sorry to say, If you lose your identity after taking care of a kid for 5 months, you didn't have much identity to begin with.
- mixedCase 10y ago
  The opposite is most likely to be true, as someone with nothing going on in their lives may welcome the activity.
- hesdeadjim 10y ago
  Wow man that's a pretty fucked up thing to say. The anonymity of the internet is a wonderful place for trolls and cowards isn't it?
  - Nomentatus 10y ago
    Here, substitute "identity" for friends, contacts, clubs, connections. If you vanished for five months, and then could only return once in a while, how many friends and solid connections would you have that you could really rely on? Now try five years! The answer, almost everyone finds out is very, very few. Being gone means you weren't useful to them for a long time, and that's what counts, for nearly everyone. What the elderly find out over decades about how shallow and self-serving most human contact is, you get to find out much faster. So, if your connections in a city are only five years old, and you then have a child and start to care for that child full-time - you're probably going to find out that indeed you really didn't have much of an "identity" in that town, after all. I admit it's a bit perverse (and not very zen) to equate personal identity and social contacts. But we all do - we are social creatures. When I was a teenager and my elders were saying "he hasn't found his identity yet" they precisely meant "role, group he identifies with." It took me forever to figure out that's what they meant. I still think that's a bit or more than a bit screwed-up, but it is how we conduct ourselves. Not necessarily how we should conduct ourselves, or how an enlightened Zen master would conduct themselves. So I would count the first poster whose contribution is now greyed-out as naive and unsympathetic, rather than as deliberately abusive or trolling.

xkcd-sucks 10y ago

Childcare by grandparents is pretty common outside of the USA, often in places where both parents genuinely need to work

dsfyu404ed 10y ago
It's also fairly common in the US for "poor" people.
- wutbrodo 10y ago
  I don't really get why it's not more common for all people: I have a cousin who's probably in the 99th percentile for household income and his mom helps out with his two very young kids a LOT.