I make twice as much money as my wife, which means that she was able to stay at home for six years, we were able to pay our bills and even save some money. If we tried it the other way round, perhaps we would be able to pay our bills, but would have zero financial slack, which sounds like a problem waiting to happen. Working part-time… well, for my wife it took a phone call to her current job and they agreed… but for me, it is an unachievable dream that I actually tried long before having kids. The employers want to see passion and dedication to the job, and nothing kills this signal faster than saying “I would like to work part-time”. (Even when I filter job offers by “also allows part-time”, at interview I am inevitably told that this option is only for women returning from their maternal leave… and in a year they are expected to switch to full-time anyway.) So, this removes the option of “everyone does 50% of everything”.
To avoid the situation “father completely clueless when left with kids alone”, our arrangement (pre-Covid) was that my wife leaves me alone with kids on Saturday. Of course that is far from 50% share, but it achieves the goal of kids knowing that both parents are there for everything.
I make twice as much money as my wife, which means that she was able to stay at home for six years, we were able to pay our bills and even save some money. If we tried it the other way round, perhaps we would be able to pay our bills, but would have zero financial slack, which sounds like a problem waiting to happen. Working part-time… well, for my wife it took a phone call to her current job and they agreed… but for me, it is an unachievable dream that I actually tried long before having kids. The employers want to see passion and dedication to the job, and nothing kills this signal faster than saying “I would like to work part-time”. (Even when I filter job offers by “also allows part-time”, at interview I am inevitably told that this option is only for women returning from their maternal leave… and in a year they are expected to switch to full-time anyway.) So, this removes the option of “everyone does 50% of everything”.
To avoid the situation “father completely clueless when left with kids alone”, our arrangement (pre-Covid) was that my wife leaves me alone with kids on Saturday. Of course that is far from 50% share, but it achieves the goal of kids knowing that both parents are there for everything.