Re: Why the Widening Gender Gap in Computer Science?
Brenda Wallace wrote:
> On Tue, Nov 25, 2008 at 4:25 AM, Lesley Binks
> <lesley.binks@googlemail.com> wrote:
>>> or ... that task goes to the father... (why is that option missing?
>>> it's far far more common than nannies, at least in my "society")
>>>
>> I didn't intend it to be missing and to top it all, iirc, my cousin
>> was a house-husband for a while some years ago.
>> Last time I spoke with him he was still at Intel. I have no idea if
>> he was able to take a career break nor how he managed his career over
>> that break.
>
> WOW. I haven't heard the phrase "house husband" since the 80s.
> It's accepted here that both parents do the child raising. i can think
> of examples of women who do fulltime mothering, but i can think of
> just as many fulltime fathers.
Out of interest, Brenda, are you in New Zealand, as your address suggests?
I ask because I'm in Australia, and in most cases Australia and New Zealand are
extremely culturally similar. And in Australia it's true that women, especially
those with children, still do the majority of parenting and housework tasks.
It's still connected, in my opinion, to the way that women, in general, earn
less on average than their male partners. So it still makes financial sense for
most couples to choose for the woman to stay at home with the kids, while the
man keeps on working in paid employment.
Most of the parents I know (nearly all young, highly educated professionals and
parents of young children) have mum working part-time and dad working full time,
with the children in part-time daycare. I don't know any couple where mum works
full time and dad works part time, though there are surely some out there.
Sad but true.
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