The Irish Times has recently been running a series of interviews with Irish people from all walks of life, and this week’s one is particularly worth reading. Annmarie Boles is a stay-at-home mother, and writes articulately and persuasively about her experience.
For her, working full-time in the home is not a second-best option, or something that she’s been forced into.
I’m the chef, the driver, the cleaner, the administrator of the household bills. It’s important that I’m there for the children when they come home from school, like my mother was. I made the choice to take on this role.
However, she believes others don’t see it this way.
I think stay-at-home parents are completely ignored and under-represented. I think there is a sense that, when you say you’re a stay-at-home parent, people start looking off into the distance, saying, “So, that’s all you do?” I have got “So, you’re a lady of leisure” a few times from people. There is a sense that society thinks you’re not that interesting.
“We are forgotten about. Our contribution, while not financial, is equally important to our communities. For instance, I’m the chairperson of the parents’ association at the school.
“There is almost a sense of embarrassment in saying you stay at home, because what’s constantly in the media is the struggle of working parents and childcare costs.”
…
“We’ve made the choice to be at home, and we’re lucky to be at home, and not everyone who is working wants to be working, but does that mean we can’t be heard too?”
As the son of a stay-at-home dad, I’m very familiar with this phenomenon. Anne also writes about her decision to open a joint bank account with her husband Shane.
We have one current account, and we both have access to it. We’re very much in agreement that it’s our money. I don’t feel like it’s my husband’s money.
This made me feel like cheering. It is not “his money”, which he is graciously giving to her. That’s such a toxic fusion of patriarchy and extreme capitalism that I don’t even know where to start. It’s their money. The work Anne does is every bit as important as the work Shane does to the welfare of the family, and to society.
I’m not sure why our society treats stay-at-home parents the way it does – I suspect it’s a combination of denigrating something seen as “women’s work”, caused by both old-fashioned sexism and some particular brands of feminism.
But whatever the reason, it’s unfair – and an unfairness that has very practical consequences. Our individualised tax system requires families like Anne’s to pay far more than a dual-earner family on the same income.
The Iona Institute’s paper on family taxation proposes concrete ways that families like Anne’s could be treated more fairly, and that the work of stay-at-home parents could be recognised and supported.
You can read it here. LINK