I'm aware of these patterns, I just think they're a downstream consequence of perfectly normal and healthy specialization. >The amount of hours worked by a hom

I'm aware of these patterns, I just think they're a downstream consequence of perfectly normal and healthy specialization. >The amount of hours worked by a homemaker has stayed steady at 60 hours per week for about 300 years while we have increasingly created household technology to make the job easier. Meanwhile, the demands on her have crept up to keep her working that many hours. At the same time, the birth rates have been going down, now standing at sub-replacement rates in many countries. With the present development, it seems like both trends will continue. It seems like a more reasonable idea then to try and encourage women to be homemakers. It seems like the efficiency remains about the same - being a homemaker supposedly requires less work now, but women also have less kids. Some stuff seems like it should be more efficient, but the human aspects will never be possible to automate. Or, I mean, you can, and people do - many parents let the iPad raise their kids. But it's not a good thing. >Historically, when jobs are male dominated, they pay well and have good benefits. If they become female dominated, the pay drops [...] >[..] men tend to have better credentials that are more career enhancing. >[..] businesses founded by men tend to be much more financially successful than those founded by women. All of this is reasonable. I could put forth some alternate explanations (men have higher testosterone -> can take better decisions under pressure -> better businessmen), but it doesn't matter. Men bringing home the bacon and women taking care of the household is a perfectly normal and healthy state of affairs. >Adult men (married with kids) typically choose colleges that serve their career goals and move the family there. What adults attend colleges? >Women were routinely prescribed Valium for depression when, arguably, they should have been told to get a divorce, but trying to establish an adequate income after being a homemaker for years can be a very hard row to hoe. Yes, that is the nature of these things. Even if they do divorce, they're an old woman with pre-existing children. Of course it would be hard to return to their carefree 20s. This is why, like everyone else, they should plan ahead. If a man makes a bad decision going into college, studying something that turns out to be a poor fit, then he will face an uphill climb trying to find a new career and an employer willing to accept him despite of his past. This is just the accepted state of affairs, and it's why we place such emphasis on making sure kids make the right choices the first time around. It's regrettable, but the alternative - an existence of weak, short-term connections, where any relationship or career is entered or exited on a whim - is not much better. >I soaked up a whole lot of such stats over the years. While dismissive replies are par for the course on HN, it remains rather aggravating to have decades of reading up on the subject dismissed so casually and by a new account that was about two minutes old when you left the comment. I do not object to the fact that there are patterns pushing women into staying home, I object to the claim that this is regrettable. To me, women working is a sign of financial desperation, whereas for men it is a natural part of life and something from which meaning is derived. You see this with the successful businesswomen - becoming a businesswoman completely destroys their ability to have a family, forcing them into a sterile and anti-natural lifestyle. Whereas, even the top male CEOs generally enjoy healthy family lives, if a bit challenged owing to their long hours. The answer isn't to make it easier for women to work, it's to realize that division of labour is an inherently good thing. "And if so, we must infer that all things are produced more plentifully and easily and of a better quality when one man does one thing which is natural to him and does it at the right time, and leaves other things." –Socrates