Balancing Work, Family Is Up to Both Genders

Having written a book on prejudice that includes a chapter on sexism, I found your article “Hoping to Learn the Art of Balancing Work, Family” on March 6 most interesting.

It reported that 48% of the power-suited, briefcase-carrying participants who recently gathered at the National Graduate Women in Business Conference at UCLA’s Anderson School felt that the largest issue facing women today was balancing work and family. The article further reported that the women’s concern over the issue of equal work for equal pay ranked a distant second (9%), and the problem of the glass ceiling was third (3%).

If this is so, the conference delegates have their priorities mixed up.

Haven’t they noticed men never gather to discuss the problem of balancing work and family? Haven’t they noticed it’s Annette Bening who is asked how she manages both, while husband Warren Beatty is asked only about his career? Why?

For men, it isn’t a problem. No one expects them to balance anything. As long as they’re paid higher wages for the same tasks and not held back by a glass ceiling, no one will. If the day ever comes when pay and promotions are no longer influenced by gender and are truly equal, then men may be forced to share equally with women the issue of balancing work and family, and the problem may finally have a serious chance of getting solved.

--DONALD KING

Los Angeles