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It’s been called the man-cession, the he-cession and the manly recession. No matter what we call it, the truth is that men are losing more jobs than women. Of the 6.4 million jobs eliminated since December 2007, men have lost 74% of them. CBS News reported that in 40% of households, women say they are the primary breadwinners. The facts are daunting, and the consequences affect families tremendously.

Will more dads stay-at-home to care for the children?

Jeremy Adam Smith, author of The Daddy Shift: How Stay-at-Home Dads, Breadwinning Moms, and Shared Parenting Are Transforming the American Family, argues that stay-at-home dads are an advance in American family life and that the growing number of such dads is a result of the last 50 years of change, though the trend may have been accelerated by the current economic climate. He points out that while moms may have a stronger initial connection to their newborns because of the pregnancy, Dads can build their connection by taking care of the child. And it seems that many fathers choose to do this.

At-home dads, and daddy blogs, are increasing in numbers every day. The Rebel Dad puts the stay-at-home dad trend under the microscope, offering a list of new daddy blogs every week. The NYC dads group is an example of how stay-at-home dads are using the internet to find each other and gather support and advice from one another. They even give tips on how to achieve a successful at-home dads group in your own neighborhood.

But I wonder, what about the dad who didn’t choose to stay-at-home?

What if he is forced into it through temporary unemployment? Is that dad going to want to do the tasks that are not always considered “fun”? At Good Times Dad, the father presents his blog as, “A look into the thoughts of a (currently, though hopefully not for long) stay-at-home dad to two of the coolest kids in the world…” Just skimming through his posts shows that yes, he is in fact taking care of the mundane tasks of supermarket shopping, making breakfast, dressing the kids and more.

This gives me hope. If both parents can achieve flexibility with their roles as breadwinner and parent, then families have more reasonable options when it comes to weathering the storm of a recession. Nowadays a married expecting mom can ask herself: should I go back to work after I have the baby, should I stay-at-home, or should I go back to work while my husband stays at home?

What do you think about stay-at-home dads? Are you a stay-at-home dad? Is your family considering this option? How do you think it affects the kids? And just as importantly, is the role reversal good or bad for the marriage?

This entry was posted on Thursday, October 29th, 2009 at 9:03 am and is filed under Balance & Fairness, Roles & Responsibilities. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response.