Considering if the Wife Will Be Employed Outside the Home After Marriage

The issue of the wife being employed outside the home can be extremely controversial. Sometimes on this question, husband, wife, and circumstances all agree. The man does not want his wife to be employed outside the home. She does not want to be so employed. They do not need the money. Or the agreement may be to the opposite situation. She wants to work, he wants her to, and they need, or at least want her earnings. When everybody agrees, it might seem that there is no problem. Yet it is not so simple. For however much they may agree, the employment of the wife outside the home does affect their relationships, for better or for worse, and usually, for both. Therefore you should consider the whole problem carefully, however much you may be agreed. Note, too, that we have used the term "employed wife," not "working wife." For most wives do work within the home, and it is generally agreed that they should. Our real concern is with the effects of outside employment of the wife on the success of the marriage.

It is easy to take some extreme position. One can assert with great vigor that a married woman's place is in the home, that no proper married woman would ever want to be employed outside, and that the employed wife is at the bottom of all the troubles of our world. Or, we can say that all such ideas are childishly silly, and represent only the desire of reactionary types to defend their privileges and their egos. But this is no adequate answer, either. The "old-fashioned" wife who stayed in her home and never dreamed of a job outside may have been subordinated. But she also had an assured position in life and society. With this came an inner feeling of security which the modern wife often lacks. One major problem of our times is that neither men nor women are quite sure what their role is with relationship to each other. Therefore both feel a degree of insecurity which undoubtedly increases the tensions between them. The solution is certainly not to be found in abortive attempts to go back to a pre-industrial era. Neither can the problem be solved by contemptuous dismissal. This whole question of your relationship to each other as man and woman you should approach with humble concern. A recognition that women vary a great deal as persons may help some.

How do different women affect the question of their outside employment?

• Some women are temperamentally so built that unless they have a job of their own they either "blow up" or constantly meddle in the affairs of their husbands and, perhaps, with other husbands too.

• Some women have special abilities as artists, authors or executives which ought not to be wasted. While they may take time out for children, they will and should be employed outside their homes for most of their productive years.

• Some women are so lacking in ability that housekeeping, even without children, taxes them to the limit of their abilities. Such women should, of course, not seek employment outside their homes.

• Some women have full-time jobs within their own homes. Included among these are:

a. Wives of certain professional men, such as ministers, government officials or big business executives who have full-time jobs as assistants and hostesses.
b. Farmers' wives
c. Mothers of small children

Some wives work extensively as volunteers in the church, the P.T.A., the Red Cross and similar agencies, and have neither strength nor time for other employment outside their homes.

For a very large proportion of non-farm wives who do not have small children, their responsibilities at home should not take more than about half their time. Such women could handle a half-time position outside the home without having more than the equivalent of one full-time position. Such employment would not only bring additional income to their families, but would make them more interesting and responsible people.

Regardless of what they should do, an increasing number of wives will be employed outside the home until they begin having their babies, and perhaps again after their children are fairly well grown.

If the wife is employed outside the home, how will the household responsibilities be allocated? Here is a question to be carefully considered. Special services, such as laundry and cleaning, delicatessens and eating out, can materially reduce the amount of work, in a household. They cannot do it all. There will still be some cooking, cleaning, dishwashing, and sewing to be done. Children in school do not need the constant attention required by infants, but they do need real supervision and support. If the wife works only half-time she may be able to carry most of the responsibility for the household work. She cannot fully meet the needs of her children. Every child needs two parents. If the wife works full-time, she should not be expected to do most of the housework in addition, even just for two.

The main difficulties which you have at this point may be emotional. It is fairly easy to state and to work out what would be a just arrangement. But both of you have been brought up in a culture in which the wife was expected to assume most of the household responsibilities. That is the way it probably was with your parents. Unless you take great care, not only the husband, but the wife also will just naturally feel that she should shoulder what is far more than her share.

Have you faced the problem of having a vocation for the wife after the children have grown? For the couple not yet married, the question of the wife having a vocation after the children have grown may seem to be a little previous. Yet it does involve policies which should be set in operation even before marriage. The woman of forty-five who seeks outside employment again faces several problems. She has been out of her field for a number of years. During this time she has lost not only skills, but contacts for employment. It is important, if she intends to go back, that during this period of absence she plan to keep up her skills reasonably well, and perhaps to keep up with the changes and advances in her field. Thus the girl who was a stenographer and hopes to become one again can keep up a modest amount of practice on her shorthand and typing, perhaps by doing a certain amount of volunteer work. The girl trained as a nurse can practice her skills every day with her own family and in her neighborhood. For the professional woman, the problem may be somewhat more difficult. We shall not attempt to solve it for anyone, but only to point out its existence, and some of the things which must be done.

Numerous studies of unemployment indicate clearly one thing; that the person who is unemployed tends to deteriorate. Indications of this deterioration are well-known. The person may become somewhat dowdy and uninteresting. For some people, not to be needed is a terrible experience. Therefore the unemployed wife may strive desperately to be needed by meddling in the affairs of her husband or her children. If she were really to work at it, she might become of real value, at least to her husband. But with unemployment often comes a lack of discipline so that the person is unable to do a good job. They just meddle and interfere.

The problem of the unemployed wife is becoming increasingly serious and difficult, particularly among our middle class. And this problem our young couple should at least become aware of, long in advance.