Calling it a sacrifice.
I graduated mid-80s and went into public accounting. Not sure if it was illegal then or not, but many, many interviewers in the years after that asked if I were married, if I had kids, and if I were having more.
I did have a baby in January. They were not happy. They moved all my client appointments back two weeks and I took the baby with me for a couple of weeks. My output was expected to be the same as any other busy season. I also had a two-year old at home.
Nuts, just nuts, what we tolerated and accepted back then. Public accounting was majority men then, even at staff levels.
Back in late 80s I was pregnant with D1 when a firm tried to recruit me. They were surprised when I told them I was 5 months pregnant because I didn’t show. After they recovered from the news, they offered me the job with guaranteed bonus, 3 months paid leave, with reimbursement for cobra (pregnancy was a pre-existing condition). Back then there was no internet, so no emails. They had a courier to deliver inter-office mail to me 2 times a day.
After D2 was born, I wanted to stay home for a while or work part time. My then employer offered to hire me as a consultant with a very generous hourly rate (grossed up with my bonus and benefits). They let me work on specific deals (structuring and closing) and not business development.
I was in IB when my kids were young and I found them to be more flexible than other industries (based on what I am reading on this thread).
With current social mores and divorce legislation, a woman who stays at home to raise kids for 15 years is taking a huge personal risk of poverty and marginalization. Having children now, for a woman, means a huge opportunity cost. The way our economy is currently structured, every able-bodied adult is expected to work for money in the marketplace. Childrearing is neither protected nor rewarded. If a woman chooses to have children with a man who will leave her, she is permanently crippling herself and her children economically. Men can, and do, skip out on paternal investment on a regular basis. Men who stick around and fight to be a part of their childrens’ lives are the minority. Most divorced men don’t seek 50/50 custody because it’s too much trouble. Employers don’t care about children or families. We are all supposed to sacrifice what is good for our families in order to be good little worker bees.
Hence the sensible choice is to not marry or have children, 50% of marriages end in divorce. The only real way women will wield power is when fertility is rationed enough to hurt.
Most people find meaning in family and children. There is something very wrong about a society that does not support these natural and normal priorities.
The odds for a lasting marriage are greater than 50% and even better odds for high income families so maybe another benefit of those “greedy” well-paying jobs?
There IS something very wrong with society, that is clear.
I think everything you say here is true, but what is the alternative? How should childrearing be protect and rewarded?
Government policies similar to what you find in many European countries re: parental leave and rights, etc. would be a good start, IMO.
@gallentjill I don’t know because our society is very individualistic and consumer oriented. Such a society cannot survive in the long run although because the US is very diverse culturally, there are pocket communities of many kinds, not always religious, that try to resist the consumerist narrative to greater or lesser degrees of effectiveness. Family is a collectivist concept and the idea of sacrificing for it is so very alien to kids raised on a diet of junk food and junk pop culture. I do believe in Enlightenment political principles of individualism but in practice, without community standards and demands, individualism just devolves into nihilism and pleasure-seeking.
No government programs are going to help a woman maintain employment parity after staying home for 15 years. At best, you might get a few months of maternity leave and paternity leave. But that doesn’t really solve the problem. Women aren’t leaving high paying jobs because they can’t get a few months off to be with a newborn. They are leaving because they need someone to be with the kids for years as they grow. Two parents working 60-80 hours a week and more just isn’t doable. At that point, you have delegated all the childcare to someone else. The answer is for people who want those jobs and want to have children to think these things out ahead of time. A woman who doesn’t want to give up career needs to consider seeking a spouse who wants to take on more of the home duties. He doesn’t have to be a full time stay at home parent, but he does need to have more flexibility. The same with a man who wants a high power career. He needs a spouse who is willing and happy to take on the home tasks. People smart enough to manage this kinds of careers should be smart enough to understand that you can’t have everything.
Much of this is a class issue. Women working in “professional” jobs at companies with maternal leave policies are much better off than women who work in low-wage contingent employment. Also, marriage is increasingly becoming a caste marker in the US, where middle-class and above women marry the fathers of their children, while lower-class women bear children out of wedlock and receive paltry state benefits to support their children in the absence of a residential wage earning man.
"Women aren’t leaving high paying jobs because they can’t get a few months off to be with a newborn. They are leaving because they need someone to be with the kids for years as they grow. "
It’s often much more than “a few months”. It also applies to government investment in good, affordable child care options. I bet many moms would continue working if they could get some of this:
https://sweden.se/society/10-things-that-make-sweden-family-friendly/
"In Sweden, parents are entitled to 480 days of paid parental leave when a child is born or adopted.
For 390 of the days, parents are entitled to nearly 80 per cent of their normal pay. Benefits are calculated on a maximum monthly income of SEK 37,083, as of 2015. The remaining 90 days are paid at a flat rate. Those who are not in employment are also entitled to paid parental leave.
Parental leave can be taken up until a child turns eight. The leave entitlement applies to each child (except in the case of multiple births), so parents can accumulate leave from several children.
Outside the 480 paid days, parents in Sweden also have the legal right to reduce their normal working hours by up to 25 per cent until the child turns eight. Do keep in mind, however, that you get paid only for the time you work."
The problem is the culture of having to work 60 hours a week to get ahead. Why can’t firms hire more people (and pay less all around) to divy up the work into 40-45 hours a week. Please look to the very productive societies - German/Dutch/other Nordic countries for this model. Very few companies pressure their employees to work excess hours. In some cases there is legislation that protects employees from overwork (see France’s email on weekend prohibition).
I used to laugh at that in my capitalistic mentality but as I get older I wish our country would STOP with this 24/7 email/work culture.
Each employee comes with overhead costs that are similar whether s/he works 40 hours or 60 hours per week. Examples would be the various insurance-type benefits, the largest of which is typically medical insurance. So there is an incentive for employers to have fewer employees each working more hours rather than more employees working fewer hours (or have employees working few enough hours to be part timers with fewer or no benefits).
Yes, this is another situation where attaching medical insurance to employment creates incentives for employers that may not be all that desirable for employees (another example is increasing the incentive to practice age discrimination in hiring and layoffs against older employees who will make the medical insurance bill go up).
Sweden is a tiny country. It is a far less complex place than the US. According to the OECD, single Swedish workers making over 867,000 SEK (around $98,000 at prevailing exchange rates) face a 70 percent overall marginal tax rate on all labor compensation earned above that threshold. 70%? No thanks.
With regard to working couples, they need to make choices and understand the consequences. Someone has to take the primary role of child rearing unless you are hiring a full-time nanny. If that is the route you choose, then you are basically hiring someone to raise your kids. If that is the case, why have kids at all? So you can see them on weekends and vacation? I have seen the power couples with 4 kids and a nanny. I just don’t get it.
Some people bristle at being a stay at home parent. They think it is mind-numbing and monotonous. I found it awesome. I learned about my little people. I joined volunteer boards that raised money for seniors. I did fundraising for the school, volunteered at church and school functions, and took on leadership positions. I was a swim team parent to make sure my kids were active in the summers. And I also worked part-time from home - never giving up my banking career. I wish someone would monetize the hours that parents put into volunteering in schools or charitable events. They provide tremendous value (a free and educated workforce) and they are an integral part of our society.
Its more than just insurance. Companies would need more physical plant to house more employees. More support staff (both managerial and staffing such as IT support). And inefficiencies that come with having to work with more people to get tasks done (and yes there are inefficiencies with having one person working 24/7 or even 80-90 hours a week but those don’t typically exist at 50-60 hours). Pay decreases likely more than people would expect.
And in many instances its not management forcing more hours its employees willing to work them to get ahead. Why is that? Why is there so much interest in college, which college, major, etc? World is getting more competitive not less.
If we both start at the same job with the same company out of college and you work 60 hours a week while I only work 40, after a year or two you will have a lot more experience than I do. More connections within the company. And with customers/clients. Hard to imagine you not being a more valuable employee to the company. Should we both be viewed the same within the company?
I don’t think France is necessarily something to emulate (at least if you aren’t doing it on an ala carte basis which typically doesn’t allow you to take what you like without what you don’t). Growth rates and unemployment rates are not good.
Takes discussion full circle. What do you do with people who work significantly less than others at the same company? Can they have all the same success with the company? How do companies plan for having employees who are not working for substantial periods of time?
Many women aren’t leaving jobs, high paying or otherwise, because they can’t. It’s a privilege to be able to do that.
When I had my last child, I worked for a firm that was on the top ten list of best places for women to work every single year. They had all sorts of policies and benefits and accommodations. Which were available only to lawyers on the partnership track. Not staff, not other professionals, not lawyers in other positions. The rest of us got zero from the firm. We were able to take six weeks off of state disability after our babies were born if we met the criteria. The sum was something like $260 per week at the top of the scale. I posted here a couple of years ago to shock and disbelief that even now, in law firms there is a huge difference between the parental leave offered to partner-track lawyers and everyone else.
Who should pay for that?
The firm where I work has agreed to hire more people and all will work less hours and make a bit less per person. The challenge is always finding enough people because it is a greedy profession and not all believe that our firm makes an effort to be different. Some that leave for money only realize the difference after they spend a year or two at their new employer. Many come back if they did not burn bridges when they left.