No word on what stay-at-home father’s work is worth (I blame for this oversight the institutionalized sexism that has no doubt “inscribed” Reuters’ Ellen Wulfhorst), but if you believe what the establishment feminists tell you, the work I’m doing as a man is probably worth, say, $164K.
And while I find that calculus flattering, the way the final number is determined (based on potential earnings for analogous jobs not subject to performance reviews) strikes me a lot like a GM hearing that I like to play catch in my backyard, then signing me to an incentive-laden five year deal for $130 million, with a club option for a sixth season.
Which, incidentally, I deserve, if you happen to be looking for a switch-hitting run producer who can play multiple positions (and yes, Houston, I’m looking at you). But still.
That’s just pure coincidence.
(h/t pw’s spouse)
$125,340. So says Salary.com according to the Wall Street Journal. Beats me where the ~$13,000 difference is. Boobies, maybe?
Phone bill.
AHA!
Men in the domestic sphere are underpaid! Because of the SEXISM!
Quick, get Barbara Boxer on the horn. I demand a rebate check!
Sure jeff, but can you hit the curveball?
Maybe you should demand a boob job.
The curveball I have no problem with. it’s lefties who throw balls that tail away from me that give me fits.
Much like blogging in that respect.
That is a headscratcher. What’s the point of the article? of the study?
Wouldn’t the cost of a live-in maid be the more appropriate guide? And what if they provide crappy psychologist services? I assume most of them do not have the proepr training. And I bet if we looked further, we’d find they don’t have malpractice insurance either.
Jeff,
I’m surprised you didn’t answer the curveball question like the future President Palmer did: “I can no hit curve ball. Straight ball I hit it very much. Curve ball, bats are afraid.”
What about the work around the house done by WORKING fathers? Or am I the only guy with a JOB that also spends his weekends cleaning my own pool, mowing my own grass, assembling freaking IKEA furniture, and cooking? Oh, and I was on my knees scrubbing the crud out of the bathtub.
So, you know, I take that report with a grain or two of salt.
As one of the countless downtrodden wretches who have suffered under the jackbooted heel of male dominion, I declare that the $$ disparity is only appropriate. BECAUSE OF THE SLAVERING PATRONAGE!!!
Anyone notice any glaring omission of jobs a mother does? Anyone? Okay, how about “sex provider”? Horny housefraus are apparently underpaid!
Same source says $71,160 in that case.
Details please ?
Sex provider? I guess women don’t enjoy sex anymore…..
Don’t forget- we also mow the lawn, move heavy objects, paint, change tires, operate the snowblower, etc…. Add that in, and add %20 because we have testicles.
Don’t forget the rest of the jobs we men do:
1)Opening tightly closed jars
2)Operating the TV remote
3)Foreplay (also known as begging for sex)
4)Lifting/carrying anything heavy
5)Pretending to like the mother-in-law
6)Tolerating the brother/sister-in-law(s)
7)Paying the bills for all the scrapbooking, gardening, tennis lesson, Pilates or Yoga classes, play or chick-flick tickets, pet bills and other activities that we, if left to our own devices, would have no interest in.
Add this to the list guys:
Pretending to be interested in what the wife is saying. That alone, increases our worth by %
That falls under the foreplay category doesn’t it?
I will say this, though. On full-time childcare and gas to and from alone, it’s about $20-$25K a year that having a stay-at-home parent saves—not to mention the benefits of having a parent home for the child, which are not really calculable.
So that’s the real world value.
But the workload can be brutal, about that I’m certain.
Yes, judging by the single malt scotch posts, brutal.
I would certainly say that stay-at-home mothers should be paid commensurate with the difficulty and variety of that work.
Of course, I would also say that civil and/or criminal action should be taken against them where they do not possess the credentials, union memberships, and licenses necessary to perform that work for pay, in the marketplace.
Suddenly, I intuit, the activism industry has just lost much of its interest in my words.
I watch my children from 7 am to 3 pm and then work from 4 to midnight.
I don’t even have the time to think about scotch.
And this is just so the wife can continue working so she can keep her tenure.
Today, I stopped watching the little demons for about 5 minutes to use the restroom and came out to find the 4 year old boy drop kicking my two year old daughter.
I’ll leave the rest to your imagination.
I wrote about a mother’s worth a year ago. Of course, I came to the conclusion that I was priceless. Just substitute “father” when you read it and it works. This issue came up a year ago when Salary.com valued a stay-at-home parent.
8) Killing spiders.
9) Parallel parking.
10) Explaining sports every single time she decides to pretend to be interested in sports (trust me, the explaining is far more grueling than the pretending).
Ummmm, say … uh, if he ends up being able to do that really well with a rugby ball, instead of a sister – would you drop me a line? I know some teams that could use help in that regard.
So do you have to pay taxes on that $138k?
I just threw a load of khakis in the wash. That must be worth, what, about a hundred bucks? I’ll comp you guys on the dishes I washed earlier.
Put the ol’ lady to work in the salt mines. Then ask her how much its worth to stay at home. Whatever, if she thinks taking depositions or managing some furniture sales account is somehow more important than keeping mom or dad at home with junior, then thats her problem. Best of luck to the kid.
I was a stay at home Dad when the daughter was a preschooler. I Changed diapers, did laundry, washed walls and floors, moved the fridge and stove to clean behind them, and had the kitchen clean and dinner on the stove when the missus came home every day. I spent an average of TWO HOURS a day on housework.
Who do you suppose watches Oprah anyway?
(This should ignite a firestorm of indignation.)
Yeah, you’ve got to consider the decreased tax burden right along with the decreased income.
Also, dunno about everyone else, but have you noticed that when you’re both working, there’s a few things that tend to happen:
1) Less careful shopping. More impulse buying, because who has the time to shop around?
2) More “comfort” shopping. Leisure time is more valuable, so why not buy those nicer items to make it more enjoyable? Pamper yourself; you’ve earned it.
3) You tend to eat out more, because, face it, you’ve worked hard all week, and really don’t feel like cooking tonight.
I am single and live alone. How much should I be paid for everything that I do for me?
Somebody has to clean, cook, do laundry, and drink all of this beer.
So were you wearing the maid’s outfit or the cellophane when she came in the door?
I keed, I keed.
I work from home when I’m not on the road, so I see what my wife does. she does a lot, and it’s totally worth the sacrifice of her full-time salary for her to stay home.
But….
Whose Mom is a psychologist? Mom is the reason people go to psychologists.
I think if God forbid something should happen to my wife, between child care, tax prep, in-home housekeepr (think Alice) we’re looking at about 50k. About what the manager of a retail store would get, without bonus. (Because, baby, I am the bonus.)
Of course, God knows what I would spend at the bars feeding drinks to girls too young for me as I try to avoid the bitter divorced women who troll the bars for revenge.
And then, what happens if I manage to catch one of those young chickas? Ooof. There’s the fake nails, the Chrysler Sebring, the boob job, the tatoos, rent, all that cocaine, the charge card at Hot Topic, the prescriptions and the bail money and thousands of Sudafed tablets for her real boyfreind, Darrell, who lives in a trailer out by Vevay, who used to make a living cooking meth but now smokes all the profits so he has to steal change from unlocked cars in the self-park garage at the casino.
On second thought, 125 -130 ain’t too bad.
Yes, but what was the condition of the house?
I understand why this kind of list got started, in an attempt to get people to understand that SAHM weren’t all bon-bons and Harlequin “novels.”
I spent 16 years as a SAHM (4 daughters) and one of the most irritating lines I’d hear from time to time when the discussion turned to occupations “oh, you don’t work, do you?”
Yet, this trying to pin exact monetary value to each activity that SAH parents do (and as if dual income families hire out all the chores of the household) really kind of defeats the purpose. (and what about the monetary value of the chores the kids do?) Families are partnerships, where the goals are shared and the division of labor is agreed upon both by personal desires and on more pragmatic terms. This is especially true when there are children to consider.
A SAH parent is the best thing any family can do for young children. Unfortunately, it can’t be that way all the time, but it doesn’t make it any less than the ideal.
They forgot Drill Sergeant in their job comparison.
Actually, that job covers most of what a homekeeper does, so they are worth about 45-55k per year.
A Drill Sergeant handles 50 troops while the housefrau only has to deal with, what, 1.2 kids these days. She gets free housing so no afor that, free food so no allowance for that. Free clothes or an allowance so thats covered. Her entertainment is paid for, whether it’s books, TV, computer/internet, dinners out. Hubby also pays for the Health Insurance.
I’ll be generous and say 3 kids, so she is worth about 3.3k per annum.
Darleen,
Amen.
Every time I walk into the mall, through the crowd of smoking, tattooed, hairdyed barbarians at the doors, I thank heaven my wife could stay home with our children.
Hey, Darleen–did you get my email from a few days ago?
Do these housewives suck cock too? Cause I hear that’s worth $50 a pop–or $250 if they throw in a legitimate therapeutic massage while they’re psychoanalyzing you….
Serious question—does beer make women fart the way it makes men fart? Never mind the repulsive giant guts….
Dan
Yes…it’s been a hell of a week and I haven’t had much time at the computer.
Let’s see what I can do with it this weekend.
heh.
All the house husbands I know are much better at the housewifery part of the job than I. Mainly because, having decided to take on the job, they actually think about the details, make choices and prioritize. They never do things just because that was how Mom did it, they choose the most effective tools, they don’t tie their masculinity to any of it, nor their egos to anything less than results. Oh, and most of the value of a stay at home spouse, in my opinion—besides the value of turning adorable little animals into worthwhile human beings—is what it frees the working spouse to do.
When people ask me what I do, I say that I’ve retired. It’s true, after all—I got my first tax-paying job at 14, stopped at 28, put all my earnings toward family expenses from 19 1/2 on, and everything I do now is by choice. What is my housewifing worth? The excess my husband has been able to earn over the years because he trusts me to backstop him on the home front. The rest he could do himself if he had to, less daycare when the trailing daughters were small.
If your looking for even more information on PC security then I would head over here as they have plenty of stuff on identity theft, antivirus software etc.