A man has posted online admitting that he can’t afford to pay his stay-at-home wife what she should truly earn.
Steven Helms has been married to Gloria for three years and they have a young son Ezra together.
Prior to the birth of Ezra, the couple decided it made the most financial sense to have Gloria, also known as Glory, become a stay-at-home mother.
But Steven recently penned a blog post in which he explained that his updated calculations indicated that he couldn’t actually afford Gloria to stay at home.
“With childcare costs it would’ve been a wash with her income at best. So we decided that she would stay home as long as it made sense,” he said.
“I’ve had this thought in my head for a while now. I’ve been thinking that I can’t afford for my wife to be a stay-at-home mom.”
“My wife stays home and takes care of our son every single day. She changes his diapers, feeds him, plays with him, puts him down for his nap, and comforts him when he’s upset. And that’s just the bare minimum,” he added.
“Yes, my wife is my son’s mother and it is a natural result of being a parent to love and care for your own child, there is also a very quantifiable dollar amount that can be attributed to the services rendered.”
Steven added together the national average salaries for all the tasks that his wife does and added them up as follows:
Full-time nanny: $705 a week, or $36,660 a year
Cleaning service: $50 to $100 per visit once a week, or $5,200 a year
Personal shopper (running errands like groceries, etc.): $65 per hour at 4 hours a week, or $13,520 a year
Chef: $240 a week, or $12,480 a year
Financial assistant (budgeting, paying the bills, etc.): $15 an hour at 5 hours a week, or $3,900 a year
Professional interactions (business dinners, etc.): $75 per hour at 4 hours per dinner 3 times a year, or $900 a year
Laundry: $25 a week, or $1,300 a year
“That’s an annual salary of $73,960. Looking objectively at an almost insultingly conservative average of the services rendered, I cannot afford my wife,” Helms wrote.
“The truth is, I’m ashamed of any time I’ve ever made her feel guilty or humored when she’s purchased something for herself. I’m ashamed that she has ever felt like she doesn’t have just as much right to our income as I do. She loves me, loves our son, and loves our family, so obviously she isn’t doing any of those things for a paycheck or even for recognition. But it certainly doesn’t hurt to know that as a stay-at-home mom her appraised salary is nearly double my actual income.”
