Hardest job but it DOES NOT cost $134,121

Mom's are the best. Sorry Dads, if your kid skins their knee, or is throwing up, or has an issue with another kid...they want comfort from mom first and foremost. They are just better at the touchy feely nuturing that kids want and need. Dad is WAY better at wrestling on the floor, playing catch, helping with math, building new toys, fixing old ones, and so on.

Dad's, well most of them, can barely even handle watching the kids (especially when kids=2 or more) for a few hours. If you're one of those dads who can good for you...I can't. My family and friends know that I can't and my famous line on this is that I would rather go fight in Iraq than have to be the sole custodian of my two kids for an extended period. I think it stems from me having basically what I'll calling engineer DNA in me. I want things to be in order, for most actions and reactions kids (and adults) have to be logical. To be able to reason with those around me....ok, I know you're laughing at this point, but there's more.

I can pick up the kids from school, take them to the doctor, I can clean, I can do laundry and if we are going to eat something tasty or complex or just downright amazing I'm the one who cooked it (sorry honey, but you know that's true). BUT, except for cooking, I would rather someone else do those things. Yes, along with being engineering anal I'm also selfish. Well, I accept my flaws and know I'm not going to change. Thank God my lovely wife accepts this as well.

When I saw the various articles about a study released today on what it would cost to pay someone to do all the things a fulltime stay at home mom does I saw two problems with it. First is the jobs the study used as a basis for the $134,121 they come up with. I'm sorry but very few moms I know even come close to having the skills to be called facilities manager, computer operator, and a few of the others that I'll just ignore so as to get in less trouble with this post! It's almost never the case that mom alone is acting in those roles. Dad is often fully responsible, even in my case, for some of those duties.

The real hard work of being parents of kids in the range of time zero to 12 years of age (I think by 12 you start putting them to work!) is picking up the house, all the hardcore cleaning, the grocery shopping and cooking and the laundry. Well, we had a great person who would do all of that (although we didn't have her do all of it) for about $2k a month. We wouldn't, and most shouldn't, want anyone other than mom or dad to do the other duties the study used as its basis for value....else you might as well sell your kids since you're not participating in their lives!

So the first thing wrong was the duties they include as part of mom's value and we deleted some of those. The second thing wrong was the shopping factor. You see, if mom has hired help and works guess what two requirements she has met for her to be the consummate shopper? Time and money. The hired help gives her the time, and the job gives her what feels like her own discretionary money (regardless of how you do finances, it feels different to them).

My analysis says a working mom with hired help costs more than the sum of the cost of the hired help and mom's salary. I realize this might only be a valid analysis for me since my wife has affairs with someone named Louis Vuitton, Mark Jacobs and Miuccia Prada (the later suggests she goes both ways!). And in real dollars a full time stay at home mom replacement (for the jobs my wife and I would have someone do) is around $24k a year...and by the way that is not for an illegal alien thank you very much!

In the end my wife, my kids mom, performs the priceless task of holding all of together. She allows me to be who I am and provide the best for my family...she provide most importantly for me, selfish me, who needs lots of attention. So whatever the cost, the value, you attach to mom it's not enough. In virtual dollars she's worth more than retired Exxon Mobile chief Lee Raymond.