Are you a working mother, or do you wish to be one? There has always been a conflict in the past, present and will be in the future also on women managing career and family life- it is tough on women almost everywhere in the world to achieve a balance doing so – but this article is not to scratch further on this debate but to find reasons why women should have a career / work!

Well on the fun side of it all, some factors that might motivate you to join or reenter the workforce:

  • Limited interaction with the spouse might mean less confrontations and reduced divorce rates.
    This research indicates it is indeed true: “In fact, as University of Michigan sociologist Hiromi Ono found in 1998, a woman is more likely to divorce if she has no earnings than if she does in fact earn money. Other researchers find that the higher the household income–whatever the target–the higher the quality of family life and marriage.”
    But this target is from the “old” 20th century report! So how about this one:
    “Divorce rates in the U.S. have been falling for the past decade, while female labor force participation rates have been rising. Aggregate data for US states show that in 2000, divorce rates across states are negatively correlated with female labor force participation rates, even after controlling for the variation in the average age of marriage. We connect these two trends in a simple random matching model which starts from the observation that a working woman, because she is paid in cash, has greater flexibility to transfer surplus to her husband than a non-working woman. Under unilateral divorce law, this implies that a marriage with two working partners is more stable with respect to outside offers than a marriage with only one working partner: marriages between working partners break up only if it is efficient to do so, while marriages between a working and nonworking spouse may break up inefficiently. We show that in aggregate there is a predicted inverted U relationship between the divorce rate and fraction of working women.”(Source: Are working Women good for Marriage, July 2006)

 

  • Leading a more active lifestyle and multi-tasking around work, household chores and picking up kids from school, could mean you losing those extra few pounds and an enhanced self-worth with a toned look.
    Check out this report on WebMD:
    “In fact, women were healthier in 2000 than ever before. When Schnittker crunched all the numbers, he found that women had somewhat better health than men. However, only employed women had better health.”

 

  • Could being a working spouse improve your sex life?
    “One longitudinal study of 500 couples by the University of Wisconsin-Madison’s Janet Hyde found that for both men and women, the highest sexual satisfaction was among couples who both worked and experienced high rewards from their jobs. A good job, it seems, is good for your sex life.”(Source: Career Women Bad Wives? Let’s Ask the Guys)

    “The majority of men and women credit their private wealth with achieving a better sex life. When viewed separately, a larger percentage of women agree with the statement, perhaps indicating that females derive a greater degree of empowerment from their financial independence than their male counterparts,” the survey, “Money as an Aphrodisiac — Being Rich Means Getting Lucky on Your Own Terms,” found. Some 84% of rich women and 63% of rich men say having money means having better sex.

 

  • A dual income brings financial stability and financial independence for women.- More Savings More Dough
    More time at work and managing house and family might mean lesser outings to the mall and more saving.
    If the savings account shows a good increase, your spouse might help you around the household chores more to keep you in the dough making business. Though they may want you to be partners in accumulating wealth, men still want women to make lesser than they do.

 

  • Are you looking for a life partner? The office might be a very likely place where you can find a suitable mate.
    Men are more likely to want to marry women who are their assistants at work rather than their colleagues or bosses, a University of Michigan study finds. The study, published in an issue of Evolution and Human Behavior, highlights the importance of relational dominance in mate selection and discusses the evolutionary utility of male concerns about mating with dominant females.”These findings provide empirical support for the widespread belief that powerful women are at a disadvantage in the marriage market because men may prefer to marry less accomplished women,” said Stephanie Brown, lead author of the study and a social psychologist at the U-M Institute for Social Research (ISR).

 

Join in and comment below on your reasons to work!