It’s really difficult to pigeonhole half the population, isn’t it? There are American women who DO stay home and raise their children, some take care of the children of women who work outside the home. There are American women who are career-focused who don’t want to stay home with their children and those who forsake altogether having children of their own. There are women who have to work to supplement their husband’s income, and others who are the primary breadwinner. The variables just go on and on.
Alas, since the “Great Society” is seems the option of staying home has declined dramatically and dangerously.
I've said enough about married women.
The entire situation of high divorce rates in American make life a losing proposition for too many children. I don't blame either gender for divorce but it's always horrible for the children. I often wonder if the working wife and abandoned children (abandoned to nannies, daycare and after-school programs) have anything to the high divorce rate. The intact family seems like a distant past dream.
As for pigeonholing half the population, well each gender does it to the other. "Men always...." "Women always..." The young do it about the old and vice versa. Different races/cultures do it to each other. People from different faiths do it. The haves and have-nots do it to each other. What group of people DON'T pigeonhole other groups?
I live in a city where costs are high and many women have to work so that the two can live here. Sending children to private schools, buying a house, taxes....keeping up with the Joneses, and such put lots of pressure on women to add their wages to the husbands. They make their own destinies.
It's my read that most couples have to decide what is important in their lives. When they decide that God is first then priorities fall into place. It really is that simple. Life is SO very, very short, it's really not smart to go for the gold, so to speak, and to walk the path that we ought. Children need. Some parent should be home. It's just plain wrong....well, you get my drift.