Breadwinner model

"Breadwinner" redirects here. For other uses, see Breadwinner (disambiguation).

The breadwinner model is a paradigm of family centered on a breadwinner, "the member of a family who earns the money to support the others". In heterosexual relationships, the breadwinner is most often the male, with the model being consistent with patriarchical family norms. The earner works outside the home to provide the family with income and benefits such as health insurance. The non-earner usually stays at home and takes care of children and the elderly. Since the 1950s, social scientists and feminist theorists have increasingly criticized the gendered division of work and care and the expectation that the breadwinner role should be fulfilled by men. Norwegian government policy has increasingly targeted men as fathers, as a tool of changing gender relations. In 2014 the US Bureau of Labor Statistics reported that 30.8% of heterosexual couples with children under 18 had a man as the sole breadwinner. 5.6% of families had a woman as the sole breadwinner. The percentage of families with female breadwinners has been declining since the end of the recession.

Rise of the breadwinner model

In Britain, the breadwinner model developed among the emerging middle-class towards the end of the industrial revolution in the mid-nineteenth-century. Prior to this, in low-income families, a subsistence wage was paid based upon the individual workers output, with all members of the family expected to contribute to the household upkeep.

There was another side to the transformation of wage relations in mid-19th-century Britain involving two closely related changes: first, a shift in the prevailing wage form, from a joint to an individual payment; and second, a shift in the predominant subsistence norm of a living wage, from a family group’s income to the ideal of an adult male-breadwinner wage. This is the notion that the wage earned by a husband ought to be sufficient to support his family without his wife and young children having to work for pay.

The increase in wages among skilled labourers and lower-middle-class workers allowed for a far larger number of families being able to support the entire family unit on one wage, and the breadwinner model became an attainable goal for a far wider proportion of society. Within this model, "The division of labour in parenting tasks can also be classified as ‘caring about’ (breadwinning) and ‘caring for’ (nurturing) children."

Advantages

In the United Kingdom, the emergence of the breadwinner norm coincided with and helped to facilitate the removal of children from the workforce. In 1821, approximately 49% of the nations workforce was under the age of 20. Throughout the century, multiple items of legislation were written in to law limiting the age at which a child could enter work and ensuring mandatory standards of education.

Historically, families that rely on the earning power of one parent have had a lower divorce rate than families where both parents are in gainful employment.

Disadvantages

One associated disadvantage is that 'male breadwinner regimes make women dependent within marriage cohabitation especially when they have young children'. In societies where the breadwinner model is present, it is common for the non-earner (predominantly women) to have broken career paths, providing unpaid labour to the family or working part-time. This contributes to the fact that, on average, women obtain lower levels of lifetime earnings than men. This income disparity can often lead to an increase in financial insecurity or poverty - predominantly affecting women - if the relationship collapses. Another risk that has been identified with this has been a higher exposure to domestic violence, which has been associated with the non-earner's lack of independent resources.

Decline of the male breadwinner

In 2013 the UK female employment rate reached 67.2 per cent, the highest since the Office for National Statistics’ records began. As women's growing presence in the professional world has risen, as well as support for gender equality, male-female relations in the home have changed, especially the breadwinner paradigm. The breadwinner model was most prevalent during the 20 year period directly after World War II. During this time the economy relied heavily on men to financially support the family and to provide the main source of income, typically relying on women to stay at home and look after the children and undertaking domestic work. ‘Women’s support for gender specialisation in marriage began to decline rapidly from the late 1970s through to the mid 1980s, this was followed by an interval of stability until the mid 1990s’. ‘As increasing proportions of women entered the paid labour market during the latter decades of the 20th century, the family model of a male breadwinner and female homemaker came under significant challenge both as a practice and an ideology’.

"There is now agreement in most literature that the breadwinner model, in which men take primary responsibility for earning and women for the unpaid work of care, has been substantially eroded".

The 'Nordic countries in particular have begun to adopt the dual-breadwinner model, with high employment rates among men and women, and a very small difference between men's and women's hours of work. With the exception of Denmark, research by the World Economic Forum has shown that all Nordic countries have closed over 80 percent of the gender gap.

Breadwinner mothers

The female breadwinner model, otherwise known as ‘Breadwinner Moms’, takes place when the female provides the main source of income for the family. Recent data from the US Census stated that '40% of all households with children under the age of 18 include mothers who are either the sole or primary source of income for the family'. 37% of these 'Breadwinner Moms' are married mothers who have a higher income than their husbands, and 63% are single mothers.

Issues With The Decline Of The Breadwinner model

Although there have been problems identified with the breadwinner model, there have also been issues noted in its decline. The decline of the breadwinner model has been accompanied by an erosion of various dimensions - sexual division of labour, the economic support of family members, and the 'distribution of time and regulation of marriage and parenthood'. With two parents in the workforce, there is a risk that a job could undermine family life, consequently leading to relationship breakdown or adversely affecting original family formation.

A recent study has found that 'women’s gains on the economic front may be contributing to a decline in the formation and stability of marriages'. Although one reason for this may be that women with greater earning and economic security have more freedom to leave bad marriages, another possibility could be that men are more hesitant to this change in social norms.

Notes

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