Comment by bArray | Hacker News Reader

Comment by bArray | Hacker News Reader

I think people have been hinting towards the point that it's generally maternity and not sexism that mostly creates the differences in career progression. Of course there was a time in history where sexism played a major role, but I think that in modern times this is mostly gone (although I know of recent cases).

We can take several actions to balance the books, but the important point I would like to ask is: Do we really want to stop/de-incentivize intelligent women from having children and having an active role on raising them?

Of course there are lots of compromises that can be made to balance the work-home life, but ultimately a decision does need to be made. Spending time with your children in those crucial fundamental years before pre-school is incredibly important and rewarding.

> Spending time with your children in those crucial fundamental years before pre-school is incredibly important and rewarding.

Yes, and employers should be more flexible to allow parents of all genders to do more of this and keep their jobs.

I think people are arguing that to be fair, time spent on raising children should be shared equally between father and mother.

Time spent raising children should be shared in a way that the parents mutually agree on. Society has no legitimate interest in which gender does the work, as long as it's a mutually agreed to arrangement that both parties are equally happy with (or, probably more accurately, equally least-unsatisfied with).

> Society has no legitimate interest in which gender does the work

That's not really true. If all women chose to raise children instead of working, many products would have poorer design due to lack of diversity in ideas. And if 95% of women chose not to work, the 5% who want to work will have a harder time in many respects.

> And if 95% of women chose not to work, the 5% who want to work will have a harder time in many respects.

Why should the preferences of the 5% override the preferences of the 95%? A widespread norm of two incomes per household makes it much harder for women to be homemakers and full time mothers (since single income households have to compete with dual income households for positional goods like housing).

> A widespread norm of two incomes per household

That is not the only alternative to a male-dominated workforce.

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