Did you know that mothers in France, rich or poor, married or single, receive free health care, year-long paid maternity leave, a cash allowance for each child, and their children can attend one of the world?s best preschools for free? Ever wonder why we don?t qualify for that package?
In 2001, economics journalist Ann Crittenden coined the term ?Mommy Tax? to describe the penalties an American incurs when they stay at home to raise a child. Penalties include loss of income, loss of social security credits for that time spent as a ?dependent,? and a back slide on the career track that is often impossible to recoup. And in the case of divorce, these sacrifices often prove disastrous. ?
Crittenden asks, ?When did caring for children? become a ?labor of love?, smothered under a blanket of sentimentality that hides its economic importance?? how the hardest-working people on earth came to be defined as ?dependents? who ?don?t work? and who have to be ?supported? by a spouse who is officially the only ?working? member of the household.? (46)
Most caring professions in the U.S. are underpaid, simply because they are undervalued. It is assumed that people do those sorts of thing because they gain some personal satisfaction, so it is fine to devalue them monetarily. ?What they really resist is the idea that altruism might be one of the engines of economic growth. This would destroy their model that self-interest drives everything? (77) says economist Nancy Folbre. Our economy, the engine of our capitalist machine, could not continue as it does if all of the unpaid workers went on strike tomorrow. The system is currently reliant upon altruism.
And gainfully employed Americans still have the greatest weekly workload in the industrialized world, an enigma that Crittenden refers to as the ?triumph of ?turbo-capitalism.?? (22) Despite the growth in technology that is supposed to make work easier, the American work day continues to get longer. This supposed triumph is leaving parents exhausted, demoralized and wondering why it is still so difficult to raise a family, and do it well, in the United States.
Our social science is outdated.
Crittenden points out that the statistician who won the Nobel Prize for developing the GNP, reported to congress in 1934 on the ?limitations of his handiwork,? pointing out that the ?system could only measure tangible things, like tons of steel?Intangibles, such as? the care provided by a family member, could not be quantified.? (66) And the only way we will be able to fix what is wrong is to get together and agree on ways to bring our nation forward into the modern day.
This is made extremely difficult by the debates and anger expressed whenever people get into what has been deemed the ?Mommy Wars.? Whether to stay home, or to put children in day care is a hot button topic, bringing out indignation, guilt and blame from both sides.
This is not a matter of one side being right and another wrong, it is a matter of our culture putting value on the work of caring, and that also includes at home elder care. Someone who pursues their career needs to know that they have not neglected their children and those who choose to stay at home to care for their children needs to be affirmed that what they do has value?even if the government classifies them as a ?dependent.?
Under our current GDP, ?A nurse feeding formula to a baby counts as a productive activity, but a mother?s breast-feeding doesn?t.? And in an era where intelligence and human inventiveness is being heralded as the number one asset to a nation?s future economic well-being, how could this not be damaging our chances for long term prosperity?
Sweden is another place famous for its happy population and strong support for families, but they had to work for it. Their issue began with a lack of labor force. They needed to get women into the work force in higher numbers and the only way to do that was to make it easier to have children and still keep a job. After an intense national media campaign, Sweden now offers parents 16 months of leave after the birth of the child?with 13 months of it paid at 80% the parent?s previous salary and another three months at a fixed rate.? The paternal leave can even be divided up between the mother and father as they see fit for their family. This is unthinkable in our American society today.
There?s plenty of talk in America about valuing an individual?s decision to either stay at home or return to the workforce full time, but in Sweden, they?ve put their money where their mouth is.? Sweden is now a world leader in percentage of women participating in government, with half of the cabinet made up of women. Mainly because, now more of them are free to do so. Imagine what America could be like with that sort of freedom.
The Price of Motherhood ? Why the most important job in the world is still the least valued
Tenth Anniversary Second edition
By Ann Crittenden
Picador
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July 4, 2011
Today we all went blueberry picking. Last year I picked blueberries alone on a Saturday morning, six months pregnant, sweating in the bright sun, lugging along my camera case and water bottle. The? Continue?reading
The sand is wild, rough, strewn with seaweed and driftwood and fragments of shell. ?It stretches for miles in either direction, dotted with palapas that rustle like palms in the wind, their dead brown limbs scratching against one another like cricket song. The beach is deserted, a rarity this far into the season, and a condition I know won?t last. Solitude, anymore, is as fleeting as the breeze. But it? Continue?reading
Snow is falling. It?s early for snow, even this kind, what I?ve come to know as 24 hour snow, the type that will coat the roads long enough for everyone to get excited but won?t last until even dusk the next day. As soon as the sun hits it, it will be gone. But it spirals down, and for now, days before Thanksgiving, it seems a sign that magic is? Continue?reading
In many ways, my life has been defined by this word.? ?I am an American.? No one could doubt the pervasiveness of independence in our national mindset.? I am also an only child, and therefore very accustomed to doing things on my own and to sole ownership ? of my toys, of my room, of my parents.? But perhaps the most telling, I was
A few months ago I had an idea that I?m going to term ?Not So Brilliant.?
I had thought: while the hubby?s out of town, I?ll let someone else cook, clean, and provide fun for my three kids for an hour. Naturally, Chick-fil-A came to mind.
I thought: I?ll go early, and beat the crowds.
This is where you can begin interjecting: ?Not so brilliant!? Because apparently? Continue?reading
Double-fisted. It?s how I eat these days. And as much as I wish that one fist was a spoonful of, say, chocolate ganache, and the other was maybe a nice forkful of cherry pie, typically it?s more like: right hand, leftover spaghetti; left hand, pureed zucchini mixed with oatmeal.
Yum.
Since my baby started eating solids two months ago, I?ve been eating pretty much every meal at a? Continue?reading
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