Joan - great post. My family history would read similar. I am surprised, now that I think about it, that my mom is the only woman I can think of in my family who was a SAHM (for more than just a few years anwyay). My spouse's family and my family had a lot of working women (in the 30s, 40s, 50s, 60s).
IT's also interesting because an at-home parent seemed like it was always a strong value in my family. (Though wasn't the case with my grandma, for one, she always worked and it wasn't out of need). However, one thing that is true is I come from large farm families and have many relatives (born in the 20s) who had 10-20 children. When I think to their laborous farm work, I am not sure how the ones who had so many children had much TIME for them. The children spent their time doing chores, etc. (few children in my family even had the time to go to school).
In addition, for those women (the few in my family that did not "work" - outside the home anyway), they spent a good chunk of their adult life pregnant.
Things have certainy changed. Women today can have children, take 5-10 years off work for their kids, and work part-time when their kids are in school, etc. IT just seems to me in this day and age where most people just have 1-3 kids, that working does not get so in the way of child rearing. The 2 certainly aren't mutually exclusive. On the other hand, certainly anyone who was having 10+ kids would probably be unable to work for MANY years. Today's society is just so different!
As to the question - would life be better if all women stayed home and men worked? No. My family is opposite. I like working and get paid well for my job. My spouse does not get paid so well for his creative endeavors, BUT he is AWESOME with kids and most household duties. He is far better for that stuff than I. I can assure you my family is better off because we don't have to adhere to some caveman standards. We do what works for us, and be BOTH appreciate the freedom to do so. In the long run we will be much better off financially since we will both work more years than not. (My spouse will maybe take off 10 years to rear children - but that's not much in a 40-year career time span). & heck, he'll be home more than our moms and grandmas were anyway.
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