(And after so many years of trying to make women be just like men, society has realized that we are indeed different and that each gender can contribute to society in a special and unique way)
The Survey done by the Pew Research Institute in the past decade shows that most mothers prefer part-time jobs. These women feel that it is difficult to be a good worker and a good mother at the same time while holding full-time positions. The percentage of women who feel this way increased by 12 percent since 1997.
Experts interpret this shift of mothers who would like to work part-time jobs instead of full-time jobs to the rising of a generation of mothers who want more flexibility. Ellen Galinsky, president of the Families and Work Institute, a nonprofit research group, said that ”[w]e found that the younger people are more family-centric than Boomers are” and that this may be the case because “[p]eople also are working longer and harder than in the past.”
“More flexibility”? Are companies listening to this? Are companies ready to take that extra step?
Unmarried Mothers change their mind
One of the biggest changes found in this survey was with unmarried mothers. Ten years ago, 49% of these women preferred full-time jobs, now only 26% of them do. Most of them prefer part-time jobs instead, but do not have the luxury to opt for one.
Fathers don’t agree
Not surprisingly, 72% of fathers say that the ideal situation for them is to work full-time jobs.
Mother or not: Overall Challenges of a full-time job
I’m not a mother yet. I’m single and I only have to pretty much take care of myself. I work a full-time job and sometimes trying to combine exercising, cooking, reading, knitting, spending time with friends, studying, paying bills, and nurturing my spiritual life can be a hassle. Sometimes I have to pick-and-choose what I need to do from all of those things, because I lack so much time to do them all. The truth of the matter is that something from that list of things gets done half-way or not done at all—reading, prayer, working out, or eating healthy. I could not even start to imagine how it would be if I had to come back home and take care of the children and my husband and still do all those things that I had to do when I was single. I really feel for women who have no other choice but to work full-time jobs.
Daycare?
This is why I am 100% confident that I cannot have a job, either part-time or full-time before my children have entered school. My mom was a full-time mom and I am so grateful for that. Way before she decided to make that decision she took me to a day care to try it out and it was a nightmare. I was probably about four and I remember what happened there like it was yesterday. The women there were rude to me and disciplined me physically without any reason whatsoever. I was a good kid! I came home and showed my mom the redness on my arms and that was the end of it. My mom was absolutely furious and determined to do something about it. It was not long after the daycare had closed forever.
I know that not many daycare places are like that, but I refuse to ever have my children in one. Since I started working full-time I have been bothered by the whole idea of working and leaving my children at daycare and I didn’t even have prospects of marriage! But I saw how my coworkers dealt with being an engineer full-time and having three or four children at daycare. Many of them have quit their jobs and become full-time mothers. So I have come up with my own rule-of-thumb: If I have to leave my children at daycare because of my job, I simply will not work. And this is, of course, assuming that my family can be supported with one income.
Michael and I know young families in which the father is finishing grad school, so the mother may have to work a part-time job during this time. Usually what they do is take turns on who takes care of the children while either parent is at work and they can do that because of the flexibility that the job and class schedules provides them with.
Don’t get me wrong, I think that women have a wonderful and unique potential in the workplace. However, women are different than men, and we cannot forget that. So many efforts from the false feminist movement that has tried to prove that men and women are the same, but it has taken us 10 years to figure out that we are not? We are different and we should consider it as a privilege and a gift. Therefore, the primary “duty” or “responsibility”—not in a negative sense— of a mother is to take care of her children and her husband. The secondary duties are directed towards society. After all, the family is the fundamental unit of society; therefore; if we want to influence society as a whole, we need to start at home.
Radical Catholic Mom has written excellent posts on working mothers and Church teaching for more background on this question.
We need to always keep in our prayers those women who have no other choice but to work many hours and be apart from their family even though they long to be with them at all times.
The question rises for public policy discussion: are companies ready to meet the needs of mothers? To answer the question we have to look at the question of “labor” in the context of Church teaching. I will be writing a post soon after finishing my study of John Paul II’s Laborem Exercens so we can understand how man is to realize his humanity through work and how human beings lose their dignity whenever they are no longer treated as the “subject or maker,” but rather treated as objects that are means to an end–production of goods.
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