Why is at always the mothers who choose to be stay-at-home mothers, and very rarely fathers? In my opinion this makes things extra hard for mothers who want to resume their career, because men are used to working with men who don't take breaks from their career to raise their children. Taking time off to raise your children is a personal choice, but it doesn't make any sense that it's almost never the fathers who sta…
Women tend to make less than men so it makes economic sense for the woman to stay at home. The problem gets worse and the disparity as the man’s career progresses and the woman’s declines, sometimes to the point that day care comes with opportunity cost relative to not working - I.e., the woman’s income doesn’t offset the increased expenses. This is a systemic and structural tragedy. That said as a hiring manager I l…
First, the choice is not binary (i.e. mother or father stays at home). There's alternatives like working reduced hours (32 hours) and using day care. This is common practice in a lot of developed countries.
Second, the cost of the wage gap resulting from suspending your career for a few years, accumulated over your entire career length is really high. My income doubled in the last 5 years. Using day care then suddenly isn't that expensive at all, at least not in my country. But you have to make the right calculations, and look at the cost of reduced future wages as well.