But What If I Don't Want to Lean In?

~ Laura

Some great numbers in Sunday’s New York Times article about women who don’t want to lean in.

Unaccounted for in the latest books offering leadership strategies by and for elite women is the fact that only 37 percent of working women (and 44 percent of working men) say they actually want a job with more responsibilities, according to a survey from the Families and Work Institute. And among all mothers with children under 18, just a quarter say they would choose full-time work if money were no object and they were free to do whatever they wanted, according to a recent New York Times/CBS News poll.

By comparison, about half of mothers in the United States are actually working full time, indicating that there are a lot out there logging many more hours than they want to be.

I’m glad that Sandberg had a few minutes to talk about high powered female CEO’s. I’m glad that there are Sandberg-types around. But now I’m ready to move on and talk about regular families who are flat-out exhausted and crave time at home with their families.

UPDATE: There’s been some backlash against this article, because it fails to mention the dads. See the New Republic and the Nation. I think that the critics are missing the point. Sure, in a better world, employers would be kinder to families. And, sure, it would be better if men did more of the housecleaning chores. BUT right now, in our less than perfect world, women are working their asses off at home and at the office, and they’re burnt out. They don’t want to deal with the office BS, but many have to because the family needs the money. In survey after survey, women say that they would rather have a part-time job, rather than a full time job.

Published by Laura

7 thoughts on “But What If I Don't Want to Lean In?”

  1. I’m siding with the New Republic on this one. The NY Times has been publishing these mother-focused articles on work-life balance ever since Lisa Belkin’s Opt Out Revolution. This coverage needs to include dads in a major way. Otherwise, we’ll be rehashing the same problem over and over again.

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  2. BTW, the professional world contains large numbers of men who don’t want to “lean in,” at least in the Sandberg mode. I make a lot more than most college professors, but a lot less than the CEO of Goldman Sachs, or even the COO of Facebook, and I don’t want to spend more than twelve hours a day in the office, or have my social life consist of actual and prospective clients, or bring home four hours of reading every night. My wife just retired, but she felt the same when she was working. Lots of people are happy doing routine professional work for six figure incomes, however contemptuous Sandberg might be.

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  3. I hate those “lean in” articles. Lean in to what? Most people don’t have the kind of job that even has a “lean-in” option, for crying out loud. But beyond that—if more women “leaned in” what difference would that make? The examples we have so far show that female CEOs are just as likely to screw the working class in general and ignore the needs of their non-“lean-in”-demographic workers or customers as their male counterparts. We don’t need more female CEOs; we need more female labor union members.

    With that said, I’m always mystified at the surveys that show women preferring part-time work or leaving the workforce. Who are these people? Rich people? I’ve never known anyone who had that much confidence in their spouse staying employed, or in their own ability to find something better than a minimum-wage after a long period out of the workforce (that probably says something about my demographic).

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  4. Hi, La Lubu!

    “With that said, I’m always mystified at the surveys that show women preferring part-time work or leaving the workforce.”

    I think for some people there may be an unspoken addendum “while making the equivalent of a full-time salary.”

    “Who are these people? Rich people? I’ve never known anyone who had that much confidence in their spouse staying employed, or in their own ability to find something better than a minimum-wage after a long period out of the workforce (that probably says something about my demographic).”

    I believe that has been part of the attraction of nursing–you can shift between taking two 12-hour hospital shifts a week to full-time (and maybe even more than that), so there’s no huge penalty for going part-time temporarily, as there would be in many other fields.

    I know quite a number of grad students’ wives who are SAHMs (or very, very part-time). In fact, truth be told, I think I probably socialize more with grad wife SAHMs (i.e. with household incomes in the very low five figures) than I do other SAHMs. In a demographic with more reliable menfolk, it’s not a terrible gamble.

    I personally am an SAHM, have done SAHM-friendly stuff (extra babysitting and tutoring and a little proof-reading) in the past and expect to eventually work part-time again, perhaps starting when it’s time to conjure up a third private school tuition. For a while I’ve been thinking of doing taxes, so that might mean starting by doing something like working tax season at H & R Block or similar and maybe eventually becoming a CPA if it suits me. If I had my druthers, I wouldn’t go full-time until all of my kids were off to college. Are we rich? Kind of, but we’d be even richer if I worked full-time.

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    1. Yes, this is a labor issue, as much or more so than it is a feminist issue. We have a labor market that is hostile to workers and hostile to families. In the past 30 years, we’ve chipped away at many of the labor gains made in the early 20th century. This is most evident among blue collar workers, but it’s also the case among white collar workers, who don’t see themselves as workers, and thus are less likely to notice their exploitation. Work life balance comes to the fore with women because they’re expected to look after families, but men also suffer when forced to work 12-16 hour days.

      For feminist reasons, I’m also wary of women my age (late 20s-early 30s), dropping out or never entering the workforce with the assumption that they will be supported by their husband forever. It’s easy after 3 years of marriage to think yours will last and is perfect, but 15-20 years later it might be a different story, and SAHMs will get screwed in a divorce. Also, even if your marriage is great, life happens. My mother was a SAHM, and she didn’t plan on my father dying at 46. Luckily she had gotten a law degree in her spare time. Even worse is that plenty of women will stay in toxic or even abusive relationships because they’re financially dependent on their spouse.

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