The Washington herald., 1918-12-02
Should Married Woman Work Outside Of Home?
By DOROTHY DIX
THE WORLDS HIGHEST PAID WOMAN WRITER

A young married woman writes
me the following letter:
Before l was married 1 was a
| stenographer and earned $500 a
week. l fell in love with a fellow
empIoye and married him. My hus-
band is all that is good and kind
and lovable but he only earns $500
week. and will probably never
make much more. He is not one Of
the type of men who get on" in the
world.
Now. as you know, $500 a week
is a bare subsistence for even a
, small family. We must do without
good clothes. without amusements,
without all the little comforts to
which we have been accustomed and
that make life worth living.
Il am a poor and Incompetent
cook and laundress. but l am a good
and competent office woman. 1
adore business. but l loathe house
work. The firm l worked for offers
me my old job back at an advanced
salary. but my husband refuses to
let me accept the position because
/ he says it would shame him for his
wife to work outside of the home.
! Yet with what / could earn doing
the work l know how to do and like
| to do added to my husbands salary.
we could live in what would seem
! luxury to US. be freed of the spectre
I of want that keeps us scared to
death and our nerves raw, and could
| lay by something for our old age.
"DO you see any good reason why
a woman who has been trained to
| some gainful occupation should not
! follow it after marriage. If the fam
! ilv needs money and if all that is
| sacrificed by her working outside of
| her home is her husband silly false
pride?"
I certainly do not. and the point
| of view generally on this question
| is shifting so rapidly, that in few
wears more people will no more eX-
Dect women to give up her business
| lust because she marries than they
will expect a man to give up his.
Women who marry rich men. and
are tired of working, will retire
from business just as a man would
! II he inherited a fortune, and want
ed leisure in which to enjoy it.
Women will temporarily withdraw
from business while bearing their
children. as men take a few months
off for rest cures or vacations. but
If will be no more a foregone con-
cIusion that matrimony bantshes a
woman from a business office to the
kitchen than that marriage trans
fers a mans activities from the
office to the wood-shed.
There are many reasons why this
change in sentiment about a woman
working outside of the home is taking
nIace. One is that we are beginning
to realize what a tremendous eco
nomic waste it is to put woman
who is capable of earning s25 to $50
A week into a kitchen to do the
work that a IS a week girl can do
better, because she has more phys
ical strength.
Every good wife desires above all
else to help her husband, but she
doesn't see why she can't help him
in the way that is easiest and most
agreeable to herself. Why shouldn't
she do her own work in her own way.
and with the money she makes hire
some domestic woman to run her
home for her? 1t would make for
comfort and efficiency all around.
Certainly the additional advantages
the mother would be able to give the
children in environment, food, clothes
and education by reason of her earn
| ings being added to the family ex-
| chequer, would certainly far more
| than offset any disadvantage that
| there might possibly be in her not
: being perpetually with her children.
But the chief reason for women con-
| tinuing after marriage in whatever
occupation they were following before
/ marriage is to be found in the fact
that 1t makes marriage possible be-
! tween men and women at the mating
! time of life-at the time when they
can best adjust themselves to each
| other, and to the matrimonial yoke,
and when they can give the best chill
dren to the world.
Under present economic conditions
| the average poor young man can not
| support a family in decent comfort
! by his own unaided efforts. II he