Will Women Ever Get Ahead?

I don’t want to seem like a complainer. But, it gets me mad that women haven’t achieved equality yet. I often wonder if women will ever get ahead.

It seems to me that women and men graduate High School and college, get careers and yet, once married, the woman seems to stop working when the children are born.

I always worked and I am glad I made that decision. I had the opportunity to stop working but I couldn’t do that for me. I have two children, 16 and 11. And I don’t think I would have been the same person if I stopped working and became a stay at home mom.

I worked too hard through college, several different jobs, and getting my master’s degree to stop with my career. But still, I meet with men almost every day and I ask them, “What does your wife do?” Almost all tell me she stays at home with the kids, cleans the house and makes dinner at night. Sounds nice, huh?

Can you imagine in this day and age women still stay home with the kids even after the kids are going to school? Oh sure, there are some men who are stay at home dads, but that’s still not the norm.

And what about women who work? Did you know that according to a recent article in the Wall Street Journal (https://online.wsj.com/public/us), 30% of the women who work make more than their husbands? Doesn’t that seem like a low percentage?

Interestingly, according to the women’s advocacy group, Count Me In (https://www.countmein.org):

• Women own 48% of all businesses in the United States — that is 9.1 million businesses and employ 27 million people.
• 55% of women provide half or more of their household’s income, yet 48 million women — that is 80% of all women in the workforce — earn less than $25,000 a year.

Okay enough with the statistics. It’s downright hard being a working mother! Salaries are low, demands are high — if only I had an extra hand!

I always feel like my kids are pulling me one way, my husband the other way and my work stretched in a different direction! Sometimes I just feel like a rubber band – all stretched out.

But, I wouldn’t have it any other way. I love having it all. I think that this recent article that appeared in the Boston Globe (https://boston.com/bostonglobe) sums it up, it states that the one thing that working women are missing is a “wife!”