By PAUL NYHAN
The Seattle Post Intelligencer
Updated: 1:03 a.m. PT July 13, 2007
Most mothers don't want it all. After generations of debate about working mothers, only about a fifth say full-time jobs are ideal, fewer than held those views 10 years ago, the Pew Research Center reported in a survey released Thursday.
Yet most of these women aren't getting what they want. Although 60 percent of working mothers say part-time jobs were ideal, only 24 percent actually hold those positions, Pew reported, citing Bureau of Labor Statistics data.
This is the contradiction of modern motherhood. Women work longhours to keep pace with rising costs of living, then go home to face the increased pressure of today's intense parenting, said Stephanie Coontz, director of research at the Chicago-based Council on Contemporary Families.
Mothers of young children feel the most pressure in balancing their work families, with only 16 percent saying fulltime work is preferred, Pew found.
In addition, unmarried mothers showed a huge drop in preference for full-time work, falling to 26 percent from 49 percent in 1997, Pew reported.
Nicole Grant is one of those mothers looking for work-family harmony as an apprentice electrician and mother of a toddler. The 29-year-old can't work part-time and says most employers simply haven't adjusted to women in the workplace.
"I was lucky if I wasn't pumping breast milk in a Porta-Potty," Grant said.
Most mornings Grant leaves her Columbia City home by 6 a.m., long before her 1-year-old son Flynn wakes, to get to work. Without her income, she and her husband, a general contractor, couldn't afford to live in Seattle.
"Despite taking a lot of pride in my work, I'm regularly overwhelmed emotionally," Grant added.
Like all surveys, the Pew report is a limited snapshot of a complex cultural dynamic. The overall margin of error was plus or minus 3 percentage points. But the margin of error rose to 8 points for data from working mothers only and 11 points for at-home mothers.
Even with its limitations, the survey offered fresh insights into one of the greatest challenges facing American parents, frustration with rising demands at work and home as critical family expenses, such as housing and college, skyrocket.
It means "that you have to work longer hours in order to be a good parent, yet we're getting the message you are not being a (good) parent if you work these long hours," Coontz said.
Despite longing for part-time flexibility, fewer married women with children worked part-time and more worked full-time in 2006 than in 2005, said former Bureau of Labor Statistics economist Charlotte Yee, citing federal data.
It turns out dads are more comfortable with those longer hours, with 72 percent saying full-time work for them is ideal.
And father may not know best because dads are far tougher on their parenting skills than moms, with only 26 percent rating their parenting a 9 or 10 on a scale of 10.
Working mothers also are harsh self-critics, giving themselves lower marks for parenting than their stay-at-home counterparts, Pew found in its survey of 2,020 adults.
Pew, a Washington, D.C.-based non-profit that surveys the public on political issues and public policies, also discovered a growing divide between these two groups of mothers.
Over the last decade, more working mothers saw a rise in working motherhood as good for society, while more at-home moms saw it as a negative development, Pew found.
Some have argued these two groups are increasingly at odds, but the so-called Mommy Wars, over whether stay-at-home or working mothers are better for baby, have largely been waged in the media.
The latest Pew survey shouldn't provide more cannon fodder for those battles, Coontz said.
"I think the fact that both of them say part-time work is (ideal) is a sign that both of them are searching for a better balance," said Coontz, who teaches at The Evergreen State College in Olympia.
What they are searching for, Coontz argues, is more flexible workweeks, better parental-leave policies and generally a more accommodating workplace for families.
Right now part-time work often isn't a viable option, says Elizabeth Hosto, once a lab technician at the Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Institute, who now stays home with her 2-year-old son and is expecting her second child.
"Part time usually means no insurance, sick leave, perks, promotions or seniority, so full time is the way to go when you have bills to pay, and you just put up with the dirty laundry, dirty dishes and exhaustion."
Balancing act of motherhood, full-time work losing favor(zt)
在我们MOMS GROUP看到这个说自己PART-TIME经历的:
1) Document your expectations around the hours and days you work in your job share plan, and make it clear that this plan, not the workload, guides the amount of hours you work, with room only for exceptional circumstances. Document corrective actions that you and your manager will take when these hours begin to be violated. Make sure this is clearly understood up your management chain, or you're going to be working full time for a nice pay cut.
2) This is my first review as p/t so I couldn't say how I will perform. My impressions are this-- I have learned to work much more efficiently in less time, and personally feel that my work quality is the same or even better. You have to become more efficient and this works to your advantage. In terms of growth opportunities, I am not sure this concept is compatible with part time work. I think part time implies a tradeoff in that you are letting up on your career acceleration in favor of more family time. Promotions imply more work and more focus on your career, so personally I don't want one or see how it would be compatible with my hours right now. Maybe that's just me. You can't have it all (unless you are the kind of person who can handle it all, in which case I would say objectively, the company should be obligated to provide those opportunities to you even while p/t, if you prove you can handle them). I however expect to do as well on reviews as before, and so far see no evidence that it has been a backwards step in terms of my reputation or the perception of my performance.
Summary: Like anything at this company, you need a supportive manager to make this work. Take all responsibility for proactively managing and enforcing your hours, and be prepared to fight back when pressured to work more-- because you will be. Accept that there are tradeoffs. Be prepared to work almost as hard as you did before, and be a lot more efficient when you are in the office. Personally I think it has been worth every effort because I spend more time with my baby than a lot of moms out here. Wouldn't trade that for any amount of cash or promotions.
1) Document your expectations around the hours and days you work in your job share plan, and make it clear that this plan, not the workload, guides the amount of hours you work, with room only for exceptional circumstances. Document corrective actions that you and your manager will take when these hours begin to be violated. Make sure this is clearly understood up your management chain, or you're going to be working full time for a nice pay cut.
2) This is my first review as p/t so I couldn't say how I will perform. My impressions are this-- I have learned to work much more efficiently in less time, and personally feel that my work quality is the same or even better. You have to become more efficient and this works to your advantage. In terms of growth opportunities, I am not sure this concept is compatible with part time work. I think part time implies a tradeoff in that you are letting up on your career acceleration in favor of more family time. Promotions imply more work and more focus on your career, so personally I don't want one or see how it would be compatible with my hours right now. Maybe that's just me. You can't have it all (unless you are the kind of person who can handle it all, in which case I would say objectively, the company should be obligated to provide those opportunities to you even while p/t, if you prove you can handle them). I however expect to do as well on reviews as before, and so far see no evidence that it has been a backwards step in terms of my reputation or the perception of my performance.
Summary: Like anything at this company, you need a supportive manager to make this work. Take all responsibility for proactively managing and enforcing your hours, and be prepared to fight back when pressured to work more-- because you will be. Accept that there are tradeoffs. Be prepared to work almost as hard as you did before, and be a lot more efficient when you are in the office. Personally I think it has been worth every effort because I spend more time with my baby than a lot of moms out here. Wouldn't trade that for any amount of cash or promotions.