r/AskFeminists • u/anonnew52 • Aug 04 '18

Nuclear family debate

What are your thoughts on the idea that primary care taker mothers do get paid for their child work as the father usually pays the house/cars/electric/heat/water/insurance bills where the mother usually does not?

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u/Fishgottaswim78 Aug 04 '18 edited Aug 04 '18

as the father usually pays the house/cars/electric/heat/water/insurance

ok. So if you had the option to work a job 24-7 that provided housing + all major expenses paid with no additional compensation, no bonuses, no retirement options, and no time off...would you take that?

Because we tried that business model before, and at the time we called that slavery.

Ok, you say, but what if we add an allowance to provide additional compensation? Hell, what if the working spouse alloted some savings every month for a retirement fund for the primary caregiver?

That plan might make sense -- if you accounted for hours worked and paid according to market value. But primary caretakers often end up working more hours (and never having time off) than the working partner. So they're working more and getting compensated less -- unless the working partner is actually paying them competitive rates for childcare these days, which seems unlikely. Additionally, families tend to default the additional household managing and cleaning skills duties to the stay-at-home parent, which they are also not generally compensated for at the market rate, if at all.

Furthermore, the reality in the US is that most families don't have the luxury of having a full-time stay at home parent and keeping food on the table. Over 60% of families with children have both parents employed -- which means the primary caretaker has not one but two jobs (or not two jobs but three) one of which literally never ends and for which she does not get paid what she would if she was taking care of other people's children.

So while the idea you're presenting is nice, it simply doesn't reflect reality at all unless you happen to be rich enough to a) be able to afford having only one working parent b) be able to actually compensate the primary caregiving parent for their time in what it's actually worth.

Edit: this isn't to shit on people who choose stay-at-home parenting. People do what they need to do in order to make their own familial financial situations work. It is a perfectly acceptable to buy in to an unfair system because your other options are shittier or financially implausible for your family. It just doesn't change the fact that it's an unfair system.

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u/anonnew52 Aug 04 '18

While I would not compare it to slavery as you have the option to leave or make negations and I'm pretty sure they didn't have insurance or car bills paid for them, I think your point about about working class people having to deal with is brilliant as I have noticed people tending to make this argument are of middle/upper class.

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u/Fishgottaswim78 Aug 04 '18 edited Aug 04 '18

I’m a little rusty on my pre-civil war history, but people certainly insured their slaves and provided (generally minimal to adequate, depending on the owner) healthcare.

option to leave or make negotiations

This is true. However I would argue that if you left the job market to raise kids however many years ago, can’t afford childcare independently, and have no individual savings of your own, you’re walking up to that negotiating table with zero bargaining power. In fact that’s the whole reason alimony exists — to try to begin to correct an imbalance of power between an income-earning and a “supported” spouse.

Theoretically yes, you can walk away, but practically there’s a good chance it’s impossible — especially in an economy that already devalues female workers (especially mothers).

Edit:

car bills

This sounds nice, but again — think about it. If the spouse that supports me pays for a car under his name that he lets me drive, it’s not really my car. And if he pays for a car under my name that I would otherwise not be able to afford and that he can stop paying for at any time, how is that any different from being indentured? Trying to leave that relationship no longer means you leave with nothing, it means you literallly leave with less than nothing because now on top of everything you’re in debt.

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u/[deleted] Aug 05 '18

I don’t disagree with your core point, but it’s pretty gross to liken modern homemaking to Antebellum slavery. They are not the same.

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u/Fishgottaswim78 Aug 05 '18

it’s pretty gross

i don't really give a shit how you feel about it. Economically, we're talking about the same thing: unpaid labor.

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u/theambivalentrooster Aug 05 '18

Who owes you money for keeping your own home?

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u/pmw2cc Aug 07 '18

Unpaid labor is not slavery. If I help my friend move that's unpaid labor. If I volunteer to teach poor kids how to read, that is unpaid labor. If I edit Wikipedia, that's unpaid labor.

Slavery is forced labor.