Getting to 50/50: How Working Couples Can Have It All by Sharing It All [Hardcover]

Sharon Meers (Author), Joanna Strober (Author)

Book Description

Release date: February 24, 2009

Sharon Meers and Joanna Strober are professionals, wives, and mothers with five young children between them. They understand the challenges and rewards of two-career households. They also know that families thrive not in spite of working mothers but because of them. You can have a great career, a great marriage, and be a great mother. The key is tapping into your best resource and most powerful ally—the man you married.

After interviewing hundreds of parents and employers, surveying more than a thousand working mothers, and combing through the latest government and social science research, the authors have discovered that kids, husbands, and wives all reap huge benefits when couples commit to share equally as breadwinners and caregivers. Mothers work without guilt, fathers bond with their kids, and children blossom with the attention of two involved parents.

The starting point? An attitude shift that puts you on the road to 50/50—plus the positive step-by-step advice in this book.

Here are real-world solutions for parents who want to get ahead in their careers and still get to their children’s soccer games; strategies for working mothers facing gender bias in the workplace; advice to fathers new to the homefront; and tips for finding 50/50 solutions to deal with issues of money, time, and much more.

From “baby boot camp” for new dads to exactly what to say when negotiating a leave with the boss, this savvy book offers fresh ideas to today’s families. It also offers encouragement, hope, and confidence to any woman who has ever questioned her choices regarding work and family.

Editorial Reviews

Review

“Getting to 50/50 is the first book I’ve read that gets it 100% right. As a frantically juggling father and spouse, I learned something valuable and new from every page. The advice is brilliant, the examples cogent and compelling, and the tone wise and humorous. For anyone who wants to enjoy a full career, be a complete parent, and remain a supportive spouse, this is the book that will help you chart the way.”—Roderick Kramer, William R. Kimball Professor of Organizational Behavior, Stanford University Graduate School of Business

" Once in a rare while, a book comes along and changes the entire nature of the discussion. If Getting to 50/50 doesn't spark a revolution in work/life balance, I don't know what will."—Deborah Copaken Kogan, author of Between Here and April and Hell is Other Parents

“Getting to 50/50 solves one of the most important pieces of the work/life puzzle: the relationship between husbands and wives.” —Sylvia Ann Hewlett, President of the Center for Work-Life Policy and author of Off-Ramps and On-Ramps: Keeping Talented Women on the Road to Success

“A creative take on how to balance the demands of work and home.  (Fathers may be surprised to find out how much they can benefit from these new arrangements.) Parents with children from 1 to 21 should  rush right out and buy this book.”—Carolyn Pape Cowan and Philip A. Cowan, authors of When Parents Become Partners: The Big Life Change for Couples


“As an organizer for social and economic justice, a true believer in equality, a working mom, and a woman leader in a male-dominated sector–the labor movement–I found Getting to 50/50 right on. It is full of great advice about how to negotiate for women and their families.”—Anna Burger, Secretary-Treasurer, Service Employees International Union (SEIU)

“Anyone who wants to combine children and careers should read this book.” —Sheryl Sandberg, COO, Facebook          

“Getting to 50/50 builds on what the latest research tells us:  that children can thrive with two working parents and that fathers and mothers play equally important roles.  I wish this book had existed when I was raising young daughters.” —Kathleen McCartney, Dean, Harvard Graduate School of Education

"Yesterday's books were about the war between the sexes. Getting to 50/50 is a peace-treaty—a solution where both sexes win."—Penelope Trunk, author of Brazen Careerist

“A tremendously refreshing and insightful read for parents who want to meet their career aspirations and raise balanced, happy children.”—Alexandria Albers, Managing Director, Morgan Stanley

“Too many women think they have to give up the career they love to have a happy family.  Getting to 50/50 shows them how to negotiate with bosses and husbands so that everybody wins–including the kids. Highly recommended.”—Linda Babcock, coauthor of Women Don’t Ask and Ask for It

About the Author

Sharon Meers is a former managing director at Goldman Sachs. Joanna Strober is managing director of a private equity firm in Silicon Valley. They live with their families in the Bay Area and speak frequently on work-life balance at universities and professional organizations nationwide.

See all Editorial Reviews

Product Details

• Hardcover: 320 pages
• Publisher: Bantam (February 24, 2009)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0553806556
• ISBN-13: 978-0553806557
• Product Dimensions: 6.4 x 1.2 x 9.6 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.2 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.5 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (11 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #140,616 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Most Helpful Customer Reviews

6 of 6 people found the following review helpful

4.0 out of 5 stars Gets To Why, But Not How May 10, 2010

By [e-mail]

Format:Hardcover

The subtitle of "Getting To 50/50" by Sharon Meers and Joanna Strober is How Working Couples Can Have It All by Sharing It All, so just in case you didn't catch it in the title, you know exactly where this book is going. As a working parent I'm also inspired by the stories of how others make it work, and the pedigree of the authors peaked my curiosity -- Meers is a former MD at Goldman Sachs and Strober is an MD at a Silicon Valley private equity firm.

The book is not a how-to for those struggling to make the dual-career + kids formula work , but rather it's an argument for why it's better if you go this route. The comments from working fathers were comforting. The statistics throughout the book were interesting -- I especially was surprised that the percentage of women who work in v. out of the home stays roughly constant across income demographics (I had assumed it would be higher as household income increases). I was hoping for more examples of how people make the juggle work and not just reasons why you should. The book, while comprehensive, seems more appropriate as a baby shower gift to couples struggling with the question of 2 careers v 1 or perhaps for the reading list of a college course. For working parents who have already made the decision to go for it, there is the we-are-not-alone benefit but little by the way of practical tips. I would have loved to see a few day-in-the-life examples of Meers and Strober's juggle.

That said, I was glad that I read it for its comprehensive dive into what can be a very polarizing issue. If you're part of a working couple that is on the fence about staying 2 incomes v 1, I highly recommend it. If you're interested in general business/ market trends, there is enough research and statistics to placate you and it's an important subject. If you've made up your mind about making it a go and looking for tips to make it easier, you will find some but not many here -- I'd save this read for when you're questioning your decision and want the comfort that dual career + kids is a good thing.

4 of 4 people found the following review helpful

5.0 out of 5 stars No more guilt March 4, 2009

By Leah A. Dickerman

Format:Hardcover

This is a really well written book that pulls together a lot of sociological research from trusted sources. Its thesis is an exciting : kids whose mothers work do just as well in school and life as those who stay at home, and kids whose fathers are integrally involved in their lives do much better than those who aren't. Finally, an antidote to working mother guilt. In addition, there's lots of good strategies for negotiating balance between parents and at work. I recommend it to anyone who wants both a productive work life and nuturing home life.

9 of 12 people found the following review helpful

5.0 out of 5 stars Excellent; Wish It Had Been Around When I Was Younger June 4, 2009

By Learning New Ways

Format:Hardcover

This is a very well done book. I am a 40-something female graduate of one of the top-ranked law schools and former partner in a large law firm. Having grown up in a patriarchal family that did not respect women and that did not communicate well with children, and being the first woman in my family to pursue paid employment and take responsibility for myself financially, I have not married or had children in part because of internal conflict and fear about how to do it in a way that did not leave me (a) not working and thus dependent and probably forced into deference or passivity and thus unable to mother effectively and suffering the other costs of being 100% financially bound to a marriage, including impoverished old age, tolerating affairs, watching children being ignored or hurt by fathers and having no way to redress it, etc., or (b) working and in conflict with a man's "ego" and worried over whether children were getting what they needed. Had this book been around or had these issues even been discussed more openly during my young adulthood, I could possibly have had a much more fulfilling life and had a family. I am envious of women coming up now, many of whom will have the role models and confidence themselves to pursue careers and many of whom may be able to find men who are more accustomed to equal status with women and who have good skills for parenting children, including the emotional availability so necessary to empathize with a baby.

The book is very thorough and deals well with many of the psychological, sociological and economic issues presented in designing and living a marriage and parenthood and makes an excellent case for the two-career marriage being workable and preferable. It also provides a number of helpful suggestions.

My only suggestion is that the book would have benefited from a closer look at what people call the "negative evidence" for the two-career marriage, so that this evidence can be examined through this newer, fairer, more productive, and more-effective-for-children concept of marriage. My understanding is that there are some children who grew up with working moms who now express unhappiness about that. (As of course, there are legions of children whose fathers have neglected them personally and now express unhappiness about that.) I don't know what was going on in those people's families (and in particular, why the mother is receiving all the blame and not the father), but it would be helpful to see the studies of those children addressed. My gut tells me this is a hangover from patriarchy in which economic dependence on men tended to cause people to feel free to blame women and place expectations on them to be available to meet others' needs and to feel fear in holding men accountable, and that this distorted people's psychology. It may also reflect that our institutions and concepts of workload have not kept up with the changing family structure, and men and women are still working very hard and long hours even when they are in two-earner families and would probably sacrifice some income for more parenting time. I hope we are headed into an era where 30 and 35 hour workweeks (for lower pay, of course) are more readily obtainable, and even become the norm, for working parents (either male or female).

One caution I would offer: I have heard from a psychotherapist that it is very important for a baby, up to the age of 2, to have an empathic, capable caregiver focused on him/her 70% or more of the time. Because these months are pre-verbal and the infant is 100% dependent on the caregiver, children who are not interacted with and whose emotional experience is stifled or ignored may learn, in even that short amount of time, to suppress part of themselves and may develop dysfunctional coping mechanisms. It can be difficult to recover from this early trauma. So, if both parents are to be caregivers it is very important for both parents to have skill at responding to, validating and interacting with the baby (this is not meant as a criticism of men; many women lack this capacity as well). Therapy, support groups, books by therapists like Terence Real or educators like John Badalament can help a man recover the emotional literacy necessary for this if he/she has buried it because of trauma in his/her own life. There are also similar books by women, such as "The Mermaid and the Minotaur", the "Second Sex", the "Dance of Anger", etc.