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I knew somebody would post a link to one of these silly articles sooner or later.
"In the tenth annual Mom Salary Survey, researchers examined 6,616 mothers and attempted to value their work by breaking down motherly duties into 10 separate titles: Day Care Center Teacher, CEO, Psychologist, Cook, Housekeeper, Laundry Machine Operator, Computer Operator, Facilities Manager, Janitor and Van Driver"
Could a SAHM qualify for any of the above jobs using just her stay at home experience on a resume? I don't think there's a single job listed here that a SAHM would be qualified for with no other prior work experience.
(1)Day Care Center Teacher - Not unless she's got training and certification as a teacher. Now could she be hired as a day care helper, probably, but that would be a lower salary than any job with the title of "teacher".
(2) CEO - Uhh, how does running your own household qualify you to be the CEO of a business? Ridiculous.
(3) Psychologist - Requires college degree and certification. Just counseling your own family is not even in the same ballpark.
(4) Cook - Cooking for your own family in no way qualifies you to prepare hundreds of meals an hour in a restaurant.
(5) Housekeeper - Maybe, but just because you can run your own household doesn't automatically mean you can run someone else's. An employer will have much higher standards than your own family - some SAHM would be good enough, most wouldn't. This is the most comparable job on the list to what a SAHM actually does so why wouldn't they just use the salary of a live-in housekeeper for this article?
(6) Laundry Machine Operator - I'm guessing there's more to this job than just pushing a couple of buttons on a machine and just doing the family laundry with your residential machines would not qualify you to work in a commercial laundry.
(7) Computer Operator - Uhh, no don't think so unless some company will hire you to google the phone number for your kid's dentist and log into your bank account to pay the bills. Plus they're saying a SAHM does this for 9.5 hours a week, which means most of the time they're counting is the time spent posting on Facebook, writing emails and surfing the internet which of course would not prepare someone to do any kind of a real computer job.
(8) Facilities Manager - Really? Finding a repairman to come fix my leaky sink and keeping track of how often my windows need to be cleaned qualifies me to be a facilities manager? Tell this to an actual facilities manager who runs a commercial office building and see how how long it takes before they're ROFL.
(9) Janitor - Just because someone can clean their own house in no way qualifies them to be a janitor.
(10) Van Driver - Doesn't being a commercial van driver require training and maybe a CDL license? Driving kids to school and soccer practice in a mini-van doesn't qualify someone to be able to drive an airport shuttle or delivery van.
Obviously you miss the point, paying for all the services to replace what a SAH mom/dad does. ....you obviously devalue women/men who do stay home and fill all those roles and more, while raising their children....and sometimes babysit for working moms/dads...Please don't tell us you are a Mom, especially a SAHM....because if you are, and have so little respect for what roles you fill that would be sad, and if your are married to a SAHM....I feel sorry for her. Feel free to share an article of your choice that supports your statements....
I don't see why there has to be all this effort to invalidate the idea that it's a job, and for most people, a challenging job.
"Well being a WOHM is harder, because..."
"Being a person with a paid job is harder, because..."
...as if those things invalidate the idea that this is work. It's not paid work. It may not require a lot of brains to do it. It's not (usually) hard labor. But it's all-encompassing and wears on your patience. It makes you touched out to have someone grabbing at you all day (something that people in those other roles don't have to deal with). It's repetitive and messy and sometimes mind-numbing. For some people, that won't be hard. For others, it is. If someone feels it's very hard, and says so, who are you say that their feelings are wrong?
I know some moms and dads who stay at home. They mostly also work from home. So there life is really busy because they are trying to work and take care of their kids at the same time. Plus, these aren't typical jobs, they are all entrepreneurs. So yes, I do think they are very busy but not necessarily only because of only their 1 or maybe maximum 2 kids.
Of course, being a stay at home parent does have monetary value. You save on day care, which might cost you easily at least 15k per year (could depend on where you live). Cooking at home will save money, though hard to say how much. Several other things to consider. Being a stay at home parent could end up being about equivalent to a relatively low paying full time job, yes, talking about dollar value. Could be worth it to do that for a few years and make sure your kids are getting the proper attention at such a vital age.
Of course I respect parents, as I respect single people, and lawyers, and baristas, etc. I do not think that their free choice to impose a specific set of challenges upon themselves makes them any more or less worthy of respect or admiration as anyone else. This seems to sometimes be the implicit inference when such stay at home parents mention their difficulties in conversation, at least in my experience.
Obviously you miss the point, paying for all the services to replace what a SAH mom/dad does. ....you obviously devalue women/men who do stay home and fill all those roles and more, while raising their children....and sometimes babysit for working moms/dads...Please don't tell us you are a Mom, especially a SAHM....because if you are, and have so little respect for what roles you fill that would be sad, and if your are married to a SAHM....I feel sorry for her. Feel free to share an article of your choice that supports your statements....
You wouldn't need to hire a janitor AND a housekeeper, for one thing. You probably wouldn't have to hire a psychologist unless your kids had special needs...in which case, a stay-at-home parent (who is NOT a psychologist) would probably still need to hire a real psychologist. You wouldn't have to hire a $300k-a-year CEO (that's just ridiculous). You wouldn't have to hire a computer specialist (still don't get the point of that one).
Also, you would still have to do your own laundry, clean your house (although it would be less of a mess, sure), cook your own meals (is it that much harder to cook for 4 than it is to cook for 2?), etc.
I'd say a more reasonable comparison would be the salary of a live-in nanny, whose salary ranges from $250 to $850, according to this article.
It annoyed the crap out of me when my daughter was little. I was working full time (50+ hours a week) AND did everything a "stay-at-home" mom does --- cooking,cleaning, laundry (Laundromat), grocery shopping, taking her to activities (I worked nights), etc etc etc.
I would have GLADLY traded places with any "stay at home mom" who thought her "job" was so hard!
Where was your husband while you were working 50 hrs a week and doing everything else?
I get irked when the SAHMs imply that they are somehow superior to any woman who hasn't pushed a couple of kids out, much like people who get up at 4 am feel they are somehow superior to anyone who gets up at 8.
What really stripped my gears, though, was that ridiculous, overblown piece of mommy-worship that took the form of trying to change tax law so that SAHM's were allowed a ridiculously huge exemption in addition to the personal exemption and of course the deductions for every kid. This was in the mid-late 90's. Luckily it blew over. It's not my responsibility to pay more tax because someone decided she'd rather have kids than work.
And all you posters who are complaining about how hard it is to be a working "mom", ask yourselves this: why is your husband not pulling his weight?
I don't see why there has to be all this effort to invalidate the idea that it's a job, and for most people, a challenging job.
"Well being a WOHM is harder, because..."
"Being a person with a paid job is harder, because..."
...as if those things invalidate the idea that this is work. It's not paid work. It may not require a lot of brains to do it. It's not (usually) hard labor. But it's all-encompassing and wears on your patience. It makes you touched out to have someone grabbing at you all day (something that people in those other roles don't have to deal with). It's repetitive and messy and sometimes mind-numbing. For some people, that won't be hard. For others, it is. If someone feels it's very hard, and says so, who are you say that their feelings are wrong?
No one.
But who are you to say that MY choices are wrong? That I didn't raise my own son? That a working mother is equivalent to a non-custodial parent.
I mean the universal 'you' and/or to anyone making those comments on this thread. Yes, they are all over this thread.
I second the other poster who said this is the dumbest thing they've heard. Do you actually know how daycare works? Do you think parents just drop the kids off on Monday morning and then go back to collect them on Friday night every other weekend? Even if a kid is in full time daycare for 9 or 10 hours a day, their parents still spend far more time with them than the daycare does. For school age kids, when a kid is in school for 6 or 7 hours a day in a class with 30 other kids, how is that teacher now spending more time with that child than their parents do?
Please don't home school; you obviously don't have a lot of common sense to pass on to your kids.
Not going to take your advice against homeschooling. I have a lot of common sense; hence why I'm homeschooling my future kids.
So, let's say your kid is in daycare for 10 hours a day --> (10 hrs./day * 5 days/wk)=50 hours/wk
A young kid that is in daycare probably gets picked up by 6pm and goes to bed by 8pm.
So, (2 hrs./wk. * 5 days/wk.)=10 hrs./wk.
Now, to add up the hours on weekend. So, I'll be nice and say they'll be up: 14 hrs./day (6am to 8pm). So, according to my calculations, the average working parent will be with their child for 38 hrs./wk
(Sat (14) + Sun (14) + Weekdays (10) =38 hours/wk.
Quote:
Originally Posted by scatteredthunder
The comparison with a non-custodial parent paying child support is perhaps excessive, but I agree with the part about a working parent not being the primary caregiver. If you're dropping your child off for 10 hours at daycare, those people are doing the majority of their care. I don't see how you can deny that. I'm not passing judgement by saying so. Parents have all sorts of reason for working and putting their kids in daycare. But it's true that you're letting someone else do a lot of raising your children, during an impressionable age.
Thank you for disagree respectfully. People don't realize this and get offended when you point it out, but it's the truth.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Ringo1
The bolded might be the dumbest thing I have ever heard. Obviously, you do not have children.
Homeschooling is a whole separate category that, to me, seems like a horrible choice for your kids. Keep them locked up with their mother all day - who thinks that is a good thing? I need to only to look at the Duggars to see exactly how I would NOT want my kids to turn out.
There you go. I can demean your choices as foolish and selfish as well.
Maybe you should want to comment until you actually HAVE kids. You might be better informed.
You're absolutely wrong about homeschooling. Please do some research on homeschooling. Homeschooled kids interact with other kids of all ages all the time.
The Duggars aren't an ideal example of how homeschooled kids turn out.
The days of wives staying home to raise the kids has almost gone away unless you are wealthy or work at home. If your going to have more than one child and don't have a husband making decent money you have to stay home with the kids. Child care is expensive. With one child it's a little easier to find some help. I'm wondering how most single moms do it. Lots of stress....
This post is only six sentences long, and they all contradict each other. Make up your mind. Is SAHP the province of the wealthy or of the poor? (hint: the data say mostly the poor)
Again, I did ALL of that while working full time. All of it and then some. School, travel teams, swim team parent, PTA, and shuttled my kid to a club practice 45 minutes away 6 days a week.
So please do not insinuate that only kids of SAHM;s can 'be involved in a variety of activities for their own personal growth and development."
Because that is just ridiculous.
Didn't. So please chill. Was responding to the poster who claimed the reason kids do extracurriculars is so Mom can get them out of her hair.
Folks, no need to get so defensive!
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