From Deseperate Housewives to Kimono in the Board Room

What is Mom's Job Worth ?

A recent study conducted in the United States by Salary.com calculated that a full-time stay-at-home mother would earn $134,121 a year if paid for all her work. This is an amount similar to a top U.S. ad executive, a marketing director or a judge, according to the study conducted on 400 mothers.

Another study conducted in UK found that working moms are healthier and thinner! WebMD Medical News, May 15, 2006

I feel a bit frustrated by this type of articles, it only gives more fuel in the "war" opposing SAHMs vs working moms. It is a nice "eye catcher" headline, but frankly in the real world, I have never experienced such a "us versus them" thing.

Even better I discovered women with children share strong common values working at home or else. The fact is we are all working, at home or outside. There is no such thing as a "perfect mom" and what works best for you at home might be a nightmare for a full-time corporate mom and vice-versa.

As I learned during my PADI Diving Rescue Certificate you should secure yourself first before helping others; this apply to your kids too. An happy mom is what is best for everybody.

At the same time, in the male-dominated culture of modern Japan, women are increasingly choosing not to marry and find children a burden to their careers and lifestyles. Japan joins Germany and Italy among a club of nations whose populations have started to shrink with average number of children a Japanese woman has in her lifetime decreasing to 1.26 in 2004.

On top of general discrimination most women face in the workplace, few has been done by Japanese companies to accommodate working mother population such as offering flexible work arrangements, access to childcare or facilitating re-entry in the work force for women returning from raising families. In an interesting poll conducted in 2005 on 10,000 working Japanese women, nearly 50% want to have the opportunity to have a full career not terminated nor even just punctuated by baby-rearing.

On the other hand, the explosive growth of Japanese women-owned businesses over the past decade, especially B2C online businesses, has demonstrated the success of the Internet in effectively bypassing traditional barriers. See an interesting article on Japanese Women Online

Beside diamonds, is the Internet women's best friend, as suggested by iMediaConnection.com ?

Anne