After more than two decades at NBC, “Today” show anchor Hoda Kotb announced she’s jumping off the career treadmill to raise her children. I know how she feels. So do the majority of America’s mothers.
However, raising our own children isn’t a choice easily available to moms who aren’t celebrities or wealthy elites. Hoda’s colleagues tearfully clapped her on the back for her “guts.” The rest of us are shamed and are forced to deal with laws and policies that favor working moms.
Regardless of wealth, education, religion, or career, the preference for staying home is shared by most women. According to the 2017 American Community Survey, 63 percent of mothers prefer working part-time or not at all. According to the Pew Research Center, although some dads stay at home too, 83 percent of the more than 11 million stay-at-home parents are mothers.
The most common reason given? Mothers want to spend time with their kids. That’s exactly what Kotb said when she announced that her children deserved a “bigger piece of my time pie.”
With a salary north of $7 million, money is no object for Kotb. But due to legal and economic policies that force both parents to work to make ends meet or even afford a middle-class lifestyle, far more mothers work full-time than want to. It’s a two-income trap Elizabeth Warren identified decades ago that is now politically inexpedient for her to talk about.
With the current level of inflation and the price of groceries and basic housing, the situation will undoubtedly get worse. Our tax laws aren’t family-friendly either.
In Suzanne Venker’s new book, How To Build A Better Life, Gen Z and millennial women speak out about how trapped they feel in their desperation to prioritize marriage and family. But they’ve been groomed to focus on their careers and not to view “marriage and motherhood as fulfilling in itself.”
Moreover, our family law system discriminates against stay-at-home mothers. Along with our nationwide system of no-fault divorce came a wave of new alimony laws that prefer rehabilitative rather than permanent alimony for women. This means the laws discriminate in favor of putting women back to work outside the home. Alimony is now limited to give them time to get up to speed on their skills and get out of the house.
Long ago, I too chose Kotb’s path, after working long hours to gather the funds for a down payment on our home. A few years later my handsomely paid then-husband left for another family. I fought for the right to stay home with my children as we’d agreed. But the family court shamed me.
While on the witness stand, the female judge asked me: “What are you doing with your days to be productive? Did any therapists for your mental health tell you you’d be better off going back to work? I haven’t heard why you want to stay home and not work.” In her decision, she slammed me verbally for my choice and in the pocketbook.
After my divorce, I started advocating for divorce reform. Instead of supporting me for my choice, feminists took up for my cheating husband. My story is not unique. Stay-at-home moms are often shamed for their choices.
And let’s not forget the Biden-Harris’ $1.8 trillion misnamed American Families Plan and its costly daycare and preschool components. “[P]reschool has been shown to increase labor force participation among parents — especially women — boosting family savings and driving economic growth,” is just one of the many family-friendly nuggets. With presidential candidate Harris, it’s of course all about “child care” too. Anything to get — and keep — women out of their homes away from their own children.
As Ben Carson argues in his new book, The Perilous Fight: Overcoming Our Culture’s War on the American Family, the assault on the American family is no longer a subtle one. All manner of agendas and policies now work in tandem to undermine and thwart the influence of parents on their children, handing over more and more control to the culture and the educational system, with the emotional, physical, and financial fallout, considerable.
“[W]e should not forcibly punish stay-at-home moms (or stay-at-home dads) for choosing to sacrifice on behalf of their families,” Carson writes, but that’s what is happening.
I recognize not all women share the desire to put their careers on the back burner. I’m okay with them leaning in, just don’t shame and discriminate against the majority of women for wanting to lean out.
I applaud Kotb’s desire to put her children first. Perhaps she’ll use some of her newfound time and freedom to advocate for the rest of us.
Beverly Willett is co-founder of the Coalition for Divorce Reform and a former lawyer. She is the author of “Disassembly Required: A Memoir of Midlife Resurrection.”
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