More on Judith Warner:
Judith Warner Wants to 'Have It All' With Your Money ("Mommy Madness" Part I)
By Eva Ellsworth
Mar 14, 2005, 00:56
Email this article
Printer friendly page
Judith Warner bemoans her misery as a career woman mother in her Newsweek article, “Mommy Madness.” She states that women with children have two choices: “You can continue to pursue your professional dreams at the cost of abandoning your children to long hours of inadequate child care. Or: You can stay home with your baby and live in a state of virtual, crazy-making isolation because you can’t afford a nanny, because there is no such thing as part-time day care, and because your husband doesn’t come home until 8:30 at night.”
Is staying home with one’s children crazy-making isolation? Many stay-at-home moms are happy. They have social lives that include their children. Since when does a healthy stay-at-home mom need a nanny? Part-time childcare is often arranged as a trade between women who have kids. Often, husbands of stay-at-home moms work more to earn the income that enables that arrangement. Sometimes, one has to choose the best among imperfect possibilities – that’s life in any society.
Mrs. Warner also bemoans “the fact that middle class life is now so d*** expensive that in most families both parents must work gruelingly long hours just to make ends meet.” I would like to know her definitions of “middle class” and “making ends meet.” Designer clothes, a new SUV every couple of years, vacations to Tahiti, etc.? Some couples whose income is at the lower end of middle class have stay-at-home moms. It can be done.
Unhappy with her “choices,” Mrs. Warner believes the taxpayers should fix things – a recycled version of Hillary Clinton’s “It Takes a Village to Raise a Child”. The problem with that idea is “the village” wasn’t consulted about creating the child. If career comes first or the couple
doesn’t want to give anything up for a child, maybe parenthood isn’t right for them.
Mrs. Warner’s demands on the taxpayers are: 1) “tax subsidies to encourage corporations to adopt family friendly policies”, 2) “government-mandated child care standards and quality controls”, 3) “flexible, affordable, locally available, high-quality part-time day care so that stay-at-home moms can get a life of their own”, 4) “vouchers or bigger tax credits to make child care more affordable, by making health insurance available and affordable for part-time workers and by generally making life less expensive and less stressful for middle-class families”, and 5) “alleviate the economic pressures that currently make so many families lives so high-pressured, through progressive tax policies that would transfer our nation’s wealth back to the middle class.”
Corporations exist to make money. This is what keeps the economy going. Their purpose is not social engineering. If “family friendly” policies are needed to attract talented employees, corporations will adopt them for economic reasons.
State and municipal regulations already exist for childcare facilities. Almost all childcare horror stories involve unlicensed daycare. Even the strictest regulations do not eliminate the need for parents to carefully vet facilities before enrolling their children.
If there is consumer demand for part-time daycare, businesses will provide it as long as market forces control prices. If government price controls are imposed, facility owners may choose to quit the childcare business.
Parents who use daycare already get a tax credit. Those who stay home to care for their own children don’t get one even though one earner families typically have lower incomes than two-earner families. Why should the taxpayers fund daycare for relatively affluent families?
Some companies do provide health insurance for part-time employees. If it helps recruit needed, qualified, part time workers, corporations will provide it. Family members of a full-time earner can be included on that earner's policy.
Judith Warner must not have heard about President Bush’s tax cut, which decreased the percentage of the nation’s tax burden for all except those in the top 20% and reduced tax rates for all income groups. If the government provides some or all of the items on Mrs. Warner’s list, we can say “goodbye” to the tax cut and “hello” to some hefty tax increases.
I am sorry Mrs. Warner’s life has been a “mess” since she had children. The taxpayers did not choose for her. It should not be their responsibility. I also made the wrong choice. I wanted to be a housewife and mom but pursued a career instead. I had ovarian failure at age 27. Is it someone else’s fault that I thought I’d have more time? No, it isn’t. I may not be living the life I planned on since I was a little girl, but I am reasonably happy because I make the best of things. Women like Mrs. Warner should learn to
do that, too. There must be some aspect of being wives and mothers that these women can enjoy.
http://www.ladiesagainstfeminism.org/artman/publish/article_1810.shtml
Mrs. Warner also bemoans “the fact that middle class life is now so d*** expensive that in most families both parents must work gruelingly long hours just to make ends meet.” I would like to know her definitions of “middle class” and “making ends meet.” Designer clothes, a new SUV every couple of years, vacations to Tahiti, etc.? Some couples whose income is at the lower end of middle class have stay-at-home moms. It can be done.
bumping this paragraph! yes!