choice and compromise

Nowadays, with an increasing number of women occupying fulltime jobs outside home and a closer gap between women’s wealth and men’s than before, the whole society has raised plenty of concerns about work-family conflict.  According to John H. Johnson, who examined data from the Survey of Income and Program Participation, on average, adding ten hours to the husband’s work week raised the probability of divorce by a small percentage point, while adding ten hours to the average wife’s work week would double the number.  Besides, he found that higher income for men reduced the probability of divorce, but in contrary, higher income for women increases the probability of divorce.  All the data showed the failure of many women to the balance of their ambitious career plans and their traditional roles as wives and mothers.  Although both husband and wife have to consider additional factors, such as family dynamics, career scenarios and lifespan when they pursue their career goals, the situation is much more disadvantageous for employed women to find out a solution due to their family obligations and limited occupational opportunities.

I did realize that it’s a little impractical and unpersuasive for a college sophomore like me to comment on the relationship between marriage, family and career, but I will introduce you the example of my mother.  Back to my childhood, my mother played a traditional role in my family.  Her occupation was so-called “housewife”.  As I grew up and became more independent, her workplace suddenly shifted from home to business market.  As a compromise to tighter and tighter family financial demand, she had to step out from home and run a business together with my father.  With no experience in accounting and management, it’s still her responsibility to quickly accommodate to the role as a household financial provider.  Struggling to become a good mother and qualified businesswoman at the same time, my mom took a large share of household and child care while stayed at workplace ten hours per day.  Her hectic and overwhelmed lifestyle continued until I went to college.  For most of women, although they have made choices and compromises throughout their careers to achieve a balance between their own desires and those of their families, sometimes the goal becomes too unrealistic to accomplish.

The main reason why more and more women enter the job market and compete with men in leader position is education.  According to the U.S. Department of Education, in the 2005-06 school year, women made up 57.5 percent of all students earning bachelor’s degrees, nearly 60 percent of students earning master’s degrees and 48.9 percent of students earning Ph.D.s.  As a result of such an intellectual advancement, women are earning more money and controlling more of the nation’s wealth than ever before.  However, the major problem is, although the definition of women in workplace has changed dramatically, the definition of women in families stayed stationary for centuries.  It’s still their prior responsibility to take a large share of housework and raise children.  The situation has become so extreme that for some women, once they have made the choice between work and family, there is no middle land for compromise; they just have to give up the other, or scramble to run two lives – one at home and one at work until the pressure squeezes out all of their energy.

Even though many women sacrifice their jobs for families or end up with tragic divorces, some women did find perfect balance.  Leslie Crossman is a clinical psychologist and a mother of three.  Her initial plan was to work in private practice, but she took the job with school district so that she would have free summer with her children.  However, not all women are capable of finding a flexible job under limited opportunities to allow them to spend plenty of time staying with their children.  Anne-Marie Slaughter, a well-known Princeton professor and former top aide to Hillary Clinton, addressed that the best solution for the conflict between work and family for women, is to “close the leadership gap: to elect a woman president and 50 women senators; to ensure that women are equally represented in the ranks of corporate executives and judicial leaders. Only when women wield power in sufficient numbers will we create a society that genuinely works for all women.”  However, even such an intelligent woman fail to give a clear answer of how women can occupy the top position in these fields without sacrificing home or family.