Abstract
The construct of dual-income families is a complex one. There is no simple cause. There is no simple outcome. Therefore, I wrote this to share my story. Statistics are important but they can be dry, manipulated, or confusing. Stories are also important and they share the richer, more robust side of an issue. We need both. I offer my story; with my story, I will share five lessons I’ve learned in my two dual-income lives. I also offer some generic take-aways for employers, society and women.
I am a Generation X-er who grew up in a very comfortable single-income family. At least that’s how I remember it. My Baby Boomer parents both lived as children in dual-income families. Both of my Depression Era working-mother grandmothers had retired by the time I was born, but I always enjoyed listening to their stories of working outside the home from the 1920s through the 1960s. Within the extended family I knew during my childhood, my mom was the only mother who was a stay at home mom (SAHM). While I think I would have liked being a SAHM in a single-income family, I grew up in the 1970s and 1980s. So, thanks to Enjoli Perfume and Helen Reddy, society expected my generation of women to “bring home the bacon”
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and do so in “numbers too big to ignore.”
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I never expected to be a SAHM; I always assumed I’d grow up to be a mom
The School Years
I was an avid learner and bright student. I loved school and excelled scholastically. My parents never pressured me to get straight A’s or achieve academic accolades. They simply expected me to try my hardest and do my best. Apparently, some internal demon convinced me that my best and the best were the same thing. Regardless, I was well-rounded and seemed to balance school, extracurricular activities, friends and family with ease. It sounds cliché, but my parents were my biggest cheerleaders. Their constant encouragement plus my perceived ability to balance life so well led me to believe I could do and be anything I wanted.
My senior year in high school a couple of my classmates jokingly voted me “The Most Likely to Be a Stay at Home Mom.” What??? Did they not know me? I was in the Honor Society, had a 4.0, and was a cheerleader. I was the president of our chapter of Fellowship of Christian Athletes and the treasurer of our senior class. PLUS, I was going to be a “mom
At Vanderbilt, I continued the balancing act. I was a cheerleader, active in a couple Christian ministries, the president of an honor society and graduated Cum Laude with a degree in Elementary Education. I was going to take the world by storm and be the best “mom
Fast Forward
Within a year of graduating, I was married (to Husband One) and had my first teaching job. Just like that, I was one half of a dual-income family. I discovered that I loved teaching and that I really liked having my own money. We had both grown up “comfortable” and were accustomed to a certain lifestyle. The dual-income model allowed us to aspire to that lifestyle. Our incomes were relatively meager but it worked for us. We had a cute little apartment, two very nice cars, stylish clothes and a few big-kid toys. We ate out; we traveled. I shopped; he sky-dived. Soon, we had a cute little rent house and three cars, two daily drivers and one just for fun. I liked working and loved the luxuries it provided me. Honestly, we were young and thought very little about the future. He was a free-spirit. I was accustomed to succeeding with very little effort. Life was good; life was fun. We had what we needed plus more.
Lesson #1: (MEAGER INCOME × 2) + (KIDS × 0) = CAREFREE LIFESTYLE
Then one spring afternoon in my second year of teaching, I became inexplicably fatigued. During dismissal that day one mother noticed my exhaustion and lightheartedly asked if I could be pregnant. I laughed it off with a quick “no thank you.” Pregnant? Not me. I had fun things to do and bills to pay. As one might guess, that mother was right; I was pregnant. I was young and impractical. Our incomes were modest and we were not planners. In short, we were very unprepared.
Seven months later, Baby One was born. The pregnancy was not without complications. Due to prenatal health issues, I unexpectedly had to quit working 6 weeks before she was born. One half of our dual-income instantly disappeared and the other half had become somewhat distracted by life’s little disruptions (again, different story for a different day). Credit cards became our primary method of payment. As I sat on bedrest, working harder than ever, to ensure the healthy arrival of Baby One I dreamed of being a mom . . . just a mom, dare I say, a SAHM. With each day, our debt grew quickly and the visions of SAHM-hood slowly withered. Debt became a dark cloud and a burden too heavy for our single-income family.
Lesson #2: (2 INCOMES − 1 INCOME) + (0 KIDS + 1 KID) = LIFESTYLE SHOCK
I quickly began a new part-time desk job in the corporate world. We staggered our schedules so one of us could stay with Baby One while the other worked. Soon, part-time became full-time. We were officially again a dual-income family. This time things were different. My money was no longer my money. His money was no longer his money. Everything became ours. Together, we had three mouths to feed, two meager incomes and one omnipresent acquaintance, Debt. Dual-income became a necessity rather than a luxury.
Lesson #3: (3 MOUTHS) + (2 MODEST INCOMES) + (1 GIANT DEBT) = DUAL INCOME REQUIRED
That was 1994. By 1998 we had three children and an ebb and flow relationship with our old friend Debt. Complications during each pregnancy required bedrest resulting in several months of only one income. Each time, we fed Debt with our credit cards. Not working was not an option. I missed the classroom, and teaching offered a work schedule that corresponded well with my daughters’ school hours and calendar. Quality time with my daughters trumped higher salaries associated with the corporate world in which I had previously dabbled. In 2000, I returned to teaching K12 full-time. I followed that career path for almost 15 years. By that time my youngest daughter was a junior in high school. My older girls were in college. And I was divorced.
Lesson #4: (PERSONAL DECISIONS) + (FORCE MAJEURE) = INCOME LIMTATIONS
Even in the best of circumstances, people rarely emerge from divorce financially unscathed. I lumbered through that horrible transition just trying to make ends meet and regain some sanity. I eventually ended up with a new husband. Husband Two earned a steady and occasionally substantial income. In fact, his first wife had been a SAHM.
Not long before I married Husband Two, his legal assistant had to quit her job. He needed an assistant. I wanted a job. We could have survived on his income alone. But, why do so? I was almost 50, had no kids left at home, had grown accustomed to working and wanted to have my own spending money. Frankly, since we did not absolutely, positively, NEED my income, I would not have taken just any job. My standards were high and I could finally afford to be picky. Teaching is mentally and physically exhausting; so, returning to teaching elementary school full-time was out of the question for me. I wanted a less stressful job. But, most important, I wanted a job that allowed me to spend time with my adult children and help with my newly acquired (and slightly younger) step-children. I wanted a schedule that could flex with my kids’ schedules. I was willing to sacrifice money for flexibility. I was able to sacrifice money for flexibility because my husband’s income was sufficient. That was my thought process. So, when my husband needed a new assistant, he offered me the job and I took it. Thus, we began our dual-income family life together.
Obviously not all life lessons fit into succinct equations. So, I offer Lesson #5 in a more typical format, that is, the complete sentence: Life and income reboots are not confined merely to fairy tales.
Conclusion
During my adult years, I have been one half of two very different dual-income families. In my first dual-income life, our two modest incomes initially provided a few luxuries. But, once our children were born, those two occasionally unstable incomes were absolutely essential. Regardless, time with my young children was of utmost importance to me and I chose a job with a schedule similar to theirs. In my second dual-income life, my paycheck was largely supplemental. That job afforded me the luxury of helping my kids financially during their college years, but more significantly, it provided me the opportunity to spend time with whom and how I wanted.
What I Want Employers to Know
We need to change the way we think. According to the Pew Research Center, in 2016, two thirds of couples with children under 18 were dual-income households.
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In my experience, there seems to be a systemic assumption that a married woman’s income is discretionary income. I believe this notion is partially responsible for the gender wage gap in America. Sarah Jane Glynn
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explained this well in her revised version of “Breadwinning Mothers Continue to be the U.S. Norm”: . . . there is still a deep and often unconscious belief that women’s earnings are not central to their families’ economic security. This same belief too often has created a tolerance for gender-based wage disparities that have resulted in fewer resources for families.
However, in many cases a family absolutely must have two incomes to make ends meet (see Lesson #3). The bottom line is that the days of assuming a household’s second income, regardless of the provider’s gender, is surplus income are over.
What I Want Society to Know
Time poor is a real thing. In their “Call for Papers: The Inadvertent Consequences of Dual-Income Households,” Ashley Whillans and Allan Schweyer 5 state “that as many as 80% of respondents felt time poor—like they didn’t have enough time to complete work or spend time with friends or family.” I was first introduced to the concept of time poor by Ashley Whillans’ 2019 Harvard Business Review piece titled “Time for Happiness.” 6 Thank you, Ashley and Allan, for pressing the issue.
What I Want Women to Know
Women, know what you value. Figure out what matters most to you and GO FOR IT! I love that women today have so many choices: stay single, marry, work, don’t work, kids, no kids, have fur-baby kids and so on. What’s most important to you may change with time. Regardless, it is imperative that you know what you value most. In the context of this paper, we are asking: Is that money or time? Are those mutually exclusive? Can you have enough of both? And how much control do you have over either?
Lesson #4 taught us that life is an unpredictable amalgam of conscious choices and circumstances over which we have little or no control. Together, these things will affect the amount of both time and money you have to spend. Based on what you value most, invest and spend both wisely. Then, be warned; life will punch you in the gut a time or two and knock you off course. When that happens do your best to stay focused on what you value most.
Then, remember Lesson #5, life and income reboots are real, not just fairy tales.
I once heard someone say that money can’t buy you happiness; but it can buy you a WaveRunner and those are FUN! With a quick Google search, one will find countless quotes, jokes and memes regarding money and time, some profound others cliché. We are promised neither, yet life without either is most challenging and life without both is nearly impossible. I’ll end with my favorite money and time quote, one by Harvey MacKay
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: Time is free, but it’s priceless. You can’t own it, but you can use it. You can’t keep it, but you can spend it. Once you’ve lost it you can never get it back.
Footnotes
Declaration of Conflicting Interests
The author declared the following potential conflicts of interest with respect to the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article: The Editor in Chief of Compensation & Benefits Review is my brother.
Funding
The author received no financial support for the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article.
