Dual-Earner Families

International Perspectives

What are the problems and pressures dual-earner families face? How do attitudes towards women differ within the public (paid) and private (domestic work and child care) work force from country to country? Offering an international perspective on dual-earner families, this volume compares the United States with nine countries to examine different socio-cultural, political, and economic systems. It explores the ways in which dual-earner couples are reconstructing gender and family roles to balance the demands of work and the family. In particular, the contributors discuss such timely topics as division of labor, transition to parenthood, household financial management, identity dilemmas, and elder care. Students and professionals in women's studies, family studies, sociology, policy studies, and organization studies will find this cross-cultural study of gender equality within the family of great interest and use. "The economics of everyday life dictate the need worldwide for both partners to take paid employment. The papers in this book explore the many ways that gender and family roles are being reconstructed in consequence. Drawing on material from many parts of the world this is an essential contribution to the debate about gender and role relationships." --Journal of the Institute of Health Education "The book clearly demonstrates the importance of avoiding ethnocentric analyses, while providing crossnational insights about the opportunities, pressures and potential 'agendas for change' for dual earners. A most informative and topical volume, it makes interesting reading for those concerned with developments in the family, with changing patterns of work and employment, and with issues of gender and gender equality." --IIRA Bulletin "This edited collection of 13 articles on the state of dual-earner families in several nations is probably the best available review summary of empirical studies on this topic. Each chapter is filled with data, and the international perspective is informative as it shows how different cultural and economic conditions have produced both the same and unique problems for the wives in this new family structure. . . . There is a wealth of information here which questions whether the nuclear dual-earner family is an ideal worth pursuit." --Journal of Marriage and the Family