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Remote work may have fueled a baby boom among U.S. women

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Re: Remote work may have fueled a baby boom among U.S. women

#301

Post by welshwelsh »

chasd00 wrote: post #238
PuppyTailWags wrote: post #236

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Among women I know, I don't see this attitude. Women I know who want careers actually want it because they don't want to be dependent on other people. Every woman I know either has personal experience or knows another woman with personal experience of being in an abusive domestic household and being unable to leave because of no personal income. That's a huge motivator not to be SAH.

my point still stands that a woman saying they want to be a "mom" and not have a career is looked down on by their peers due to the last 30 years of career propaganda. Fear of being abused is something else entirely.

It's not about career, it's about independence. Anyone without the financial ability to leave has no power in a relationship and will be exploited or abused.

That's not an edge case, it's an inevitable consequence of being financially dependent. It happens 100% of the time.

Re: Remote work may have fueled a baby boom among U.S. women

#303

Post by [deleted] »

chasd00 wrote: post #238
PuppyTailWags wrote: post #236

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Among women I know, I don't see this attitude. Women I know who want careers actually want it because they don't want to be dependent on other people. Every woman I know either has personal experience or knows another woman with personal experience of being in an abusive domestic household and being unable to leave because of no personal income. That's a huge motivator not to be SAH.

my point still stands that a woman saying they want to be a "mom" and not have a career is looked down on by their peers due to the last 30 years of career propaganda. Fear of being abused is something else entirely.

[deleted]

Re: Remote work may have fueled a baby boom among U.S. women

#304

Post by fragmede »

welshwelsh wrote: post #301
chasd00 wrote: post #238

Earlier quoted context omitted.

my point still stands that a woman saying they want to be a "mom" and not have a career is looked down on by their peers due to the last 30 years of career propaganda. Fear of being abused is something else entirely.

It's not about career, it's about independence. Anyone without the financial ability to leave has no power in a relationship and will be exploited or abused. That's not an edge case, it's an inevitable consequence of being financially dependent. It happens 100% of the time.

"will be" and 100% of the time sounds, pardon me, very sad a point of view. What about those that don't abuse their position of power and responsibility? There's even a popular cultural saying, "with great power comes great responsibility". Is there really no one out there with, well, good in their hearts in your world?

Re: Remote work may have fueled a baby boom among U.S. women

#305

Post by foobarian »

matthewowen wrote: post #107
foobarian wrote: post #97

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I can't wrap my head around this insane US model that takes grandparents out of the picture. Maybe it's because moving is so easy? But grandparents love grandkids and they do it for free - it's a win-win.

I would suggest that most grandparents don't want to look after their grandkids for 40 hours a week. And for that matter, many grandparents have jobs of their own – the average age of a first time grandparent in the USA is 50.

Maybe the separate housing is the root of the problem. In more traditional EU societies, grandparents and parents live in the same house. This means one less set of people needs to generate income to pay for housing.

Re: Remote work may have fueled a baby boom among U.S. women

#306

Post by yamtaddle »

klipt wrote: post #300
yamtaddle wrote: post #260

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Yes, in the US there are tax credits, SNAP, etc. None of these even come close to replacing the life income changes. Our three kids are gonna cost us at least half a million dollars by the time they're all 18, between lost income, daycare costs, higher housing costs (not just a bigger house to maintain a similar comfort level, but also one in a much more expensive area than we might otherwise live in, since we have…

> Kids are basically financial suicide unless you're crazy-rich. Or if you're very poor, then the more kids you have, the more you receive in benefits. Many poor people manage to have more kids than middle class people. The middle class parent thinks "if I have another kid how will I pay for their college?" The poor parent just sends their kids to community college or if they're amazingly brilliant and get into Harva…

Well, right. Some of that spending is technically not necessary (we could choose to live in a worse school district, of course—clearly many people do, or there wouldn't be schools there) but you're also probably gonna feel like (and, maybe, be) a terrible person if you don't spend more to get your kids into better schools if you can. Like, obviously couples whose income doesn't amount to at least a million dollars over 18 years aren't spending half a million on raising their kids, but many of them nevertheless do have kids.

But, the result of all this psychology and zero-sum competition (as housing/schools are) is that kids tend to eat all available income up to a point—and, indeed, if you cross a certain income threshold and can afford top-tier private school, there's another entire tier of potential and hard-to-convince-yourself-not-to-do spending above that.

Re: Remote work may have fueled a baby boom among U.S. women

#307

Post by pempem »

gammarator wrote: post #278
dilap wrote: post #243

Earlier quoted context omitted.

We could go even further: You don't need the mother at all; you can always just raise the baby on formula. But that doesn't change that the mother-child bond is a unique and special thing, and that there are real benefits to breast-feeding, straight from the breast. And beyond, the simple fact is that many women really want to be with their babies. It's misguided to pretend that there aren't biological realities unde…

The benefits of both breast milk and breast feeding are nonzero but are often overstated. Many of the studies are not very good. The book “Lactivism” provides an entertaining account of recent history: https://www.amazon.com/Lactivism-Fundamentalists-Physicians-...

Came to post this ^

Only 30 years ago, the pendulum was fully swung in the direction of formula.

Having gone through the pregnancy gauntlet recently I've found

- There are many studies posited but no one ever talks about the 'n' or the replicability. The studies are almost always asking you to do something uncomfortable or be scared (amnio may cause a miscarriage; the best brain developing breastmilk is the feed btwn midnight and 6am; blah blah blah)

- There are so many people happy to tell women they should just stay home or if they dont they'll miss crucial moments or not develop their children's potential or even ability to love correctly. Oddly this is crucial for society and yet the US society provides near 0 support to make this happen

Re: Remote work may have fueled a baby boom among U.S. women

#308

Post by Terr_ »

bombcar wrote: post #176
lotsofpulp wrote: post #62

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A newborn that has been fed and slept and lays around is easy, but it is not long before the kid wants to play with keyboard and mouse and headphones and unplug things, etc. I setup my brother MFC printer on the ground so they can mess with the display and open and shut the flatbed scanner and whatnot. The device can apparently take quite a beating.

Kids adore doing whatever their parents are doing, so giving them some "office equipment" can be a great way to get them "working away" for quite some time. Maybe I should dig up some old IBM PCs, those things were tank-like, but likely the kids would start trying to beat each other with the keyboard.

> Kids adore doing whatever their parents are doing

Sometimes I worry that many parents focus in "teaching" or "instilling" a desired behavior at the expense of "role-modeling" it through personal lived demonstration. The latter can be far more powerful because of how kids are hardwired to mimic adults... at least up until a certain age where they go the opposite way. :P

> Maybe I should dig up some old IBM PCs

It's be great if there were more "child's version of adult thing" toys that focused on a realistic appearance rather than multicolored plastic. (Unless there's some research showing that actually helps?)

Re: Remote work may have fueled a baby boom among U.S. women

#309

Post by bell-cot »

pempem wrote: post #307
gammarator wrote: post #278

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The benefits of both breast milk and breast feeding are nonzero but are often overstated. Many of the studies are not very good. The book “Lactivism” provides an entertaining account of recent history: https://www.amazon.com/Lactivism-Fundamentalists-Physicians-...

Came to post this ^ Only 30 years ago, the pendulum was fully swung in the direction of formula. Having gone through the pregnancy gauntlet recently I've found - There are many studies posited but no one ever talks about the 'n' or the replicability. The studies are almost always asking you to do something uncomfortable or be scared (amnio may cause a miscarriage; the best brain developing breastmilk is the feed btwn…

> ...so many people happy to tell women they should...

People happy to sit on their fat fannies and "supervise" the folks busting their asses to do all the work...yeah. That was old before the first pyramid was put built.

Re: Remote work may have fueled a baby boom among U.S. women

#310

Post by magicink81 »

rajin444 wrote: post #131
poulsbohemian wrote: post #72

It's election season and I've been out talking to voters, who share their life stories... what I would say is that there are many women who are choosing WFH because they either can't afford or can't find day care, which may lead to deciding that hey, they might as well have another baby if they are now committed to this employment model. I've spoken to several women who were over-qualified for the jobs they had taken…

> women have stepped up for their families often to the detriment of their own careers Forcing 2 household incomes was/is awful for a healthy society. Women are the only humans that can produce children and they have to do it during a relatively short time window - especially if we want to reproduce at replacement level. Raising children should be regarded as one of the most important things a woman can do because th…

On this topic, Gabor Mate and Gordon Neufeld wrote the book I wish I had read before our daughter was born: Hold Onto Your Kids [1]. Thesis: Strong attachment to a parent or caretaker is foundational for human development - neurological, physiological, and psychological - the whole body, mind, and spirit. The impacts of years 0-5 cannot be overstated. Based on the findings presented in the book, if both parents want to work my suggestion would be to either hire a full-time nanny who will replace you as the attachment figure for those years and beyond, or have a family member move in with you and care for the child full-time. Be comfortable that your child will be more attached to this person, and love them at least a little bit more, than they love you. Be happy that your child will have their best shot at healthy development because you prioritized it for them.

Another great book that covers more of the science in depth is The Developing Mind by Daniel J. Siegel [2].

Sounds extreme? Read the books (and others) yourself and see what conclusions you reach.

[1] https://www.amazon.com/Hold-Your-Kids-Parents-Matter/dp/0375... [2] https://www.amazon.com/Developing-Mind-Third-Relationships-I...

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