

Why Women Still Can’t Have It All - kamaal
http://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2012/07/why-women-still-cant-have-it-all/309020/?single_page=true

======
DerpDerpDerp
This article is acting like men can.

Except that pretty much every guy I know who has a really high ranking job
could give me a litany of family sacrifices he's had to make to get there.
Missed recitals, sporting events, and just generally being absent from quite a
lot of family life.

If women - people in general - want to opt for that path, I completely support
them. But don't act like you're doing as much for the company as the person
who makes the opposite choice - that you're on equal footing with someone
willing to make those sacrifices - if you do.

I agree that there are lots of things in society that can change, and perhaps
people would be happier if they did, but the idea that you can split your
efforts and still deserve to be at the top seems silly to me.

(And there's at least one full generation of men who have had a serious look
at the balance guys typically face between family life and professional life
that aren't satisfied with the current status quo, which this article seems to
be largely ignoring.)

~~~
pja
The available evidence shows that for ordinary jobs output turns negative once
you start working more than 40 hours a week or so. I personally doubt that
decision making by executives is an exception to this rule: quite the contrary
in fact.

Unfortunately career development can often be an arms race: those who put in
the longest hours are perceived to be more committed and effective and are
promoted in preference to their colleagues who may be just as effective but
are "only" in the office 40 hours a week.

Arms races are pernicious things that benefit nobody, but can be very
difficult to eliminate unfortunately.

~~~
DerpDerpDerp
I completely agree that it's not necessarily a good thing; I was just pointing
out that it's am arms race that impacts both genders.

------
jeffjose
This is a pretty old article, which has seen a ton of discussion already.

