As child care costs soar, more parents may have to exit the workforce

Re:As child care costs soar, more parents may have to exit t... by gizmo on Thursday November 02, 2023 @10:05AM (#38113673)

The mother would be not as poor as before marriage but way poorer, because now she's older, she's been out of the workforce for a long time, and still has to take care of the kid(s) after the divorce. The father, by contrast, has accumulated professional connections and work experience. Single mothers end up in poverty way too often, and alimony is an attempt to rectify this.

As with any legal process you can find examples where justice has failed, but overall a world with alimony and child support is way better than the world we had before, where women were condemned to destitution after divorce.

[ Parent | on HN ]

Re:As child care costs soar, more parents may have to exit t... by willcipriano on Thursday November 02, 2023 @10:19AM (#38113861)

The previous comment was about divorcing someone without money. In your example my argument holds as she would receive not only half of the current assets but a claim on his future earnings, no matter how she behaves in the marriage.

Great deal for women. Horrible deal for men.

[ Parent | on HN ]

Re:As child care costs soar, more parents may have to exit t... by gizmo on Thursday November 02, 2023 @10:47AM (#38114225)

I get what you're saying but it's plainly false.

Just look at the statistics: https://www.ssa.gov/policy/docs/population-profiles/marital-...

In broad strokes: married people tend to be way wealthier than never married people, and divorced women do much worse than divorced men do. (Women are much poorer across the board also, of course). If your claim was true then the poverty gap between divorced men and divorced women would be much smaller, and we see that's not the case. If alimony/child support is such a raw deal for men it should be visible in the statistics.

Note the poverty rate for men who never got married vs men who got divorced. Marriage is not the raw deal for men you think it is.

[ Parent | on HN ]

Re:As child care costs soar, more parents may have to exit t... by willcipriano on Thursday November 02, 2023 @12:10PM (#38115642)

Correlation is not causation. Women try to marry men with resources. Men without resources or ambition are ignored by women.

[ Parent | on HN ]

Re:As child care costs soar, more parents may have to exit t... by watwut on Friday November 03, 2023 @05:02AM (#38126165)

Per all stats, men do better financially after divorce. They feel more lonely then women however. On average, women do worst after divorce financially and are at bigger threat of poverty.

And still, in USA, women do file for divorce more, because simply that financial control is not enough to keep someone in. Funny enough, it tends to be be organizations dominated by men who push against no fault divorces and toward even bigger financial dependence of their female partners.

[ Parent | on HN ]

Re:As child care costs soar, more parents may have to exit t... by willcipriano on Friday November 03, 2023 @06:42AM (#38126773)

Per all stats men do financially better in virtually all situations. They also work longer hours at more difficult jobs and take less sick and vacation days.

[ Parent | on HN ]

Re:As child care costs soar, more parents may have to exit t... by frumper on Thursday November 02, 2023 @11:46AM (#38115177)

That's a great theory, but it often doesn't work out that way. She's likely to settle for less half just to get out of the marriage. She likely doesn't have a good way to get her own future earnings.

Even if it goes to plan with her getting alimony and partial retirement, she's still dependent on her ex-husband which is a frustrating and often vulnerable position. It means he is still in her life. He can harass and badger her about how she spends money. He may pay, but he might often be late, or sporadic, which causes her bills to be overdue and have late fees. Maybe he starts hiding money, he could even tank his income for a year or two to have the courts change the agreement. None of this stuff is transparent and can be very adversarial.

[ Parent | on HN ]

Re:As child care costs soar, more parents may have to exit t... by willcipriano on Thursday November 02, 2023 @12:13PM (#38115703)

The average age a woman gets married is 31. This concept of the virgin bride who can't care for herself is long dead. She provided for herself for a decade prior to marriage. She can handle a few late payments.

You are a victim of a common cognitive bias: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Women-are-wonderful_effect

[ Parent | on HN ]

Re:As child care costs soar, more parents may have to exit t... by frumper on Thursday November 02, 2023 @12:54PM (#38116454)

I had no thoughts of a young bride. I'm thinking of a woman that'll get married, then raise some kids for a decade and end up in her mid 40s divorced and have been out of the workforce for a decade. I think you're projecting your thoughts and biases into my statements.

[ Parent | on HN ]

Re:As child care costs soar, more parents may have to exit t... by johnnyanmac on Thursday November 02, 2023 @11:27PM (#38124109)

> but overall a world with alimony and child support is way better than the world we had before, where women were condemned to destitution after divorce.

Maybe we could start with making the minimum wage a living wage again so this doesn't happen.

And I'm very ambivalent about this. The problem with "justice" here is that the govt. has no incentive to cut off alimony because it means the govt. foots the bill. That's why even some outrageous outliers like someone's sperm being stolen from a bank has resulted in that man paying alimony. Judges exist to cover edge cases like that and its just not being done.

[ Parent | on HN ]