The argument is over: You absolutely, positively cannot afford to be a fulltime stay-at-home mom.
Save it. Just save it! No need to delve into arguments about personal choice or what is good for children or families. That’s all been hashed out in the mommy wars. It’s not about those issues. This is about money.
You. Cannot. Afford. To. Be. A. Fulltime. Stay-at-home-mom. You just can’t.
What’s that you say? Your husband is a banker? And your daddy is rich? Your spouse adores you – even though you gained, like, 40 pounds with each pregnancy? I don’t care. It makes zero financial sense for any of those 5.1 million women in the United States who are stay-at-home moms (thanks, Census data). That is about one in five married-couple families who have decided to put their family’s futures in jeopardy.
Don’t just take it from me. I recently interviewed Joanne Cleaver, a career consultant and author of The Career Lattice.
“Stepping off the career track completely is career suicide,” Cleaver told me. “Don’t do it.”
Her reason? You will no doubt lose the momentum you’ve built, the network you accumulated, the credibility you’ve earned. But these longtime truths are accelerated in today’s tech-driven world – no matter what industry you’re in. “If you completely leave the workforce, when you return you’ll have to completely reinvent yourself with new skills, new credentials and a new portfolio,” Cleaver said. “You might as well start in a new career.”
These challenges translate into a tougher time getting a new gig when you want one. And once you do, you’ll earn less than had you kept a foot in the workforce while caring for your kids. Researchers at Harvard and University of Chicago found that when professional women leave the workforce for three or more years, they suffer a compensation hit of about 37 percent. For female MBAs who take time off to be with children, pay drop 41 percent relative to male MBA earnings.
However, if you plan ahead and keep a hand in the game, things might turn out differently. Of course, things don’t always happen as planned.
Take me, for instance. I was married to a really nice, devoted guy who made a handsome income. We had a baby, bought life insurance, set up automatic contributions to our retirement accounts and emergency savings, and even started a college fund. He had disability insurance, but that never came into play after he fell off a cliff and nearly died of a brain injury – of which the lingering and devastating symptoms played a big role in dissolving our marriage.
Who could have planned for that?
When I had my first child I’d enjoyed a lucrative freelance writing business, which I cut down to about third-time after Helena was born. After my ex moved out, I quickly ramped up my workload. So when the child support and health insurance stopped because he was fired (again, related to the injury), I was able to swing my family financially, even after I had another baby.
Had I not had a career, or an ongoing business, my son, daughter and my life would be in a very, very different place. We would likely be broke. I would be angry. I would be making decisions about our futures out of fear instead of love and happiness.
That’s all the scary news. Here’s the good news: we live in an age when parttime, consulting and freelance work is not only increasingly available to employees, but also growing in popularity among employers. How can you keep a foot – toe, knuckle, nail – in your industry while still giving your children the time you feel they deserve?
Brainstorm, ask colleagues and mentors for advice, and get creative to make sure you remain relevant. You can’t afford not to.
Related articles
- Admit it: You’re a married single mom, and you hate it (wealthysinglemommy.com)
- The View From The Other Side (themissingsockblog.com)
- Becoming a SAHM- Transitions (wifeymommysuperhuman.com)
- How to Transition from SAHM to WAHM (theworkathomewoman.com)
- Staying Happy as a Stay-at-Home Mom (thebump.com)
- SAHM- Can I really be classified as that? (virginlewisfamily.wordpress.com)
- Are You a SAHM? a WAHM? Me, Im a SWAHM! (makersofhome.wordpress.com)
NYT adds WSM to its Motherlode blogroll
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Ryan Seacrest plugs my 10-Yr Marriage Contract post!
I discuss kids and divorce live on Headline News 
I keep stirring stuff up on The Huffington Post 
Woman’s Day digs my 10-Yr Marriage Contract post
CafeMom’s TheStir loves my 10-Yr Marriage Contract idea 
xoJane gives my “Beautiful Daughter” essay some love 
The Awl promotes my take against SAHMs
Business Insider features my mommy money insights 
Circle of Moms names WSM “Top 25 NY Mom Bloggers”
Amen, awesome advice… I am all for changing your life structure to do what you can to spend time with your kid(s) which I’ve done in my own life but you can never, ever lose site of your own career path. Life as a single mom becomes an amazingly creative business but it certainly is easier when you have your own career already. The tough thing with your advice is that the people who need to read it aren’t reading this site yet:). You can never, ever depend on someone else for your financial and emotional support. A backup plan is always key!
What didn’t make it into this post is the story of a woman I interviewed recently: she was married for 15 years to a very wealthy banker — all the while she abandoned her career all together. She thought she was made in the shade, even after the divorce as she got such a hefty settlement. Then her husband lost his job and continued to struggle — he tried opening a hot dog franchise, but it failed. She is making due with a little child support and is building a craft franchise, but her lifestyle is TOTALLY different and she is really struggling.
Ugh, the middle-class assumption that all 5.1 million of those women left fulfilling careers with growth potential to have children. What about those of us who had jobs, not careers? What about all of us who, if we returned to our pre-baby jobs would not even be able to cover the childcare costs to replace ourselves? Not all of us were lawyers or marketing executives or academics in our past lives. I think this advice only makes sense for a minority of women
Sarah, I disagree. Even jobs — opposed to careers — get stagnated by time off. You miss out on raises, promotions and new skills every time you step out of the workforce, no matter if it is a white- or blue-collar job.
Emma
I agree! Yes anytime off can put you behind. The reality is that with the costs of childcare staying at home is a better option for our family while I am still going to school.
Hi Emma, I love this advice and since my own marriage breakup have tried to remind family and friends to plan for the worst case as I’m proof that it can happen to you. I was able to leave my marriage, provide for my child and for the most part be financially unscathed by my marriage breakup because I returned to my full time job after my son was born. Had I not done this – I dread to think where I would be right now.
BTW, I enjoy your site and I investigated a laundry service this afternoon to do away with the grind of weekly washing. Thanks for the good advice.
My favorite part of your comment? About the laundry! Let us know how it turns out
Very true. I would not have made the transition to being a stay at home mom if I didn’t have a plan to transition my career home as well. Even with my husband having a decent job it would have been too hard to make ends meet, and I wouldn’t put 4 young sons in that position. And, it’s just not me to NOT write or work professionally, I would have been very unhappy. I think I need to remember more to add the “working” in my new title when speaking with other Moms. I know that many resent that I have quit my job or wonder “how can they afford it?” But, it took many years of planning.
I was talking with an economist this weekend who told me for every year a woman delays having children her lifetime earnings go up 10%.
Spousal support laws need to be changed to take into account the terrible financial hit the primary caregiver in a couple takes over a lifetime. Unfortunately they’ve moved in the opposite direction, putting short deadlines on any support received.
Yes it is true that womens earnings go up the longer they wait. Have you conciser the costs of IUIs? Or IVF? They are STAGGERING! A lot of women who “did things right” are cleaned out after fertility treaments (95% are not covered by any insurance)
I would add, as someone happily married: if both spouses are working, it is a bad idea to get used to living on both spouses’ incomes. Use one income to qualify for the mortgage, not both. Use the fact of two incomes to contribute to retirement and college savings. Here’s why: things happen. My husband was unemployed for a while, leaving me the primary support for our family. I was able to make the mortgage because we had a mortgage that only needed one income. We had to cut back on some luxuries, and everyone got new coats for Christmas instead of more frivolous presents, but we did fine.
Thanks Annie – your scenario is a classic example of what happens to families all the time — and yours is a dual-income professional urban family. Shit happens. Get real and plan ahead!
Yup. I was out for 10 years. I’ve had dozens of interviews but no one wants to hire me. I wish I’d read this ten year ago.
The NYT’s Motherlode column addresses this issue right now: http://parenting.blogs.nytimes.com/2012/10/12/how-can-a-stay-at-home-mom-get-back-to-work/
Also, I just wrote an article offering interesting advice on this topic:
http://theinsider.retailmenot.com/moms-going-back-to-work.html
This would be my main concern, too. It’s just so risky. Who knows what could happen to your partner, your skills… and what about the lost earning potential/retirement savings?
eemusings: So true. Women (and men) often ignore the long-term ramifications of staying home with kids. The decision need to be more than just whether you can pay the bills those years.
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I am a SAHM (out of the workforce for 4 years now) who has just finalized my divorce. I’ll be going back to start a one year grad business program this summer. Because when I do go back, I’m not just going to settle for whatever job I can get based on previous experience that is now 4 years old. I’m going to go back and kick ass!
I agree with you now about being a SAHM, hindsight being 20/20 and all that. Though actually I will never regret staying with my kids and getting to spend this time with them, I should have at least more seriously looked at part time work. More so to maintain my individuality and maybe for the mental challenge than for the money.
The problem is I didn’t make the decision based on finances or future career prospects. And I definitely didn’t think I needed a plan B. After all, I was going to be one of the 50% that was together forever of course! I made it to attempt to make the quality of life for the family as a whole better. And I’m not talking about just spending time with the kids, I’m talking about all the nitty gritty chores, errands, cooking, etc. Which, yes, I could have started outsourcing some of if I worked, you’re right. But I think that when you have kids someones career (usually the woman) takes at least a bit of a backseat for a while, even if you do both work. And actually, I’d already sacrificed my career when I agreed to move to this smallish town with my husband and that was before kids. I thought that for the family, for the relationship, compromises should be made on both sides and that I would find other things (volunteering, or other types of fulfilling work that may not pay much) to fulfill me besides a “career”. Unfortunately, it turned out I was the only one making sacrifices and he couldn’t even keep his basic marriage vows. So, here I am.
This is a great article. As a twenty-something who is going through a divorce after just a year and a half of marriage (no kids), who never thought it would happen to her, I thank you for putting this out there. This has nothing to do with trust or love or anything. Do not ever put yourself completely at the mercy of another person. We have no control over other people, and no matter how well you think you know someone, people change. People do crazy things. My soon to be ex-husband has severe depression and decided after we were married that he didn’t want children, even though I did and made that clear before we were married. After a year and a half of taking care of him and enduring him quitting his job without telling me (luckily he had savings and so this didn’t affect me financially), he decided that he didn’t ever want children and we both need to move on. Which is fine–I am heartbroken, but I have a good job and health insurance and I can take care of myself. I’m grateful that he figured this out before I facing this children. Although I didn’t give myself over to him completely or stay home, I’m glad I’m learning this now before I did. Depend on yourself and take care of yourself.
Thanks Caitlin – it is so true that you never know what life will throw at you. Your story and mine are unusual, yet it is so common for people to find they require two incomes, whether because of divorce, illness, accidents, unemployment, random financial blows, etc. It is simply silly to think you can afford for two people (plus kids) to survive on one income.
I have been a SAHM on and off over a period of 16 yrs, doing various different jobs from time to time,i have three gorgeous children but have been through turmoil as one of my daughters has very severe allergies and thyroid problems to name but a few! I have been married 17 yrs
I know that if my daughter was well i would of managed to hold down a permanent job. However i loved constantly being there for each of my children but i have now been offered a job in an office and yes it will be tough for me to adapt from being a SAHM for so long but i have been given this opportunity so am hoping i will be able to do it well, We have lived of one wage for so long now that hopefully we will reap the rewards!
Good for you, Kate! Best wishes in your new endeavor !