>Wow! that's the best explanation I've heard for this phenomenon.
>
>My cousin gave me a similar one to why we need two incomes now in a family to be able to afford a decent home.
>
>It's the women's fault. ;-)

As usual, the corporations managed to erase themselves from the big picture, whenever there's something wrong.

First of all, two incomes almost never made a double income. One and a half or thereabouts, on the average - given that women were mostly getting lower paid jobs, couldn't do as much overtime, weren't promoted, and were even demoted when they had to take time off to care of their children.

And the destruction of the family as we knew it is also often due to forced relocation. If one of a pair gets a chance to get promoted (or to keep the job) by moving to another city, most of the time there wasn't a job for the spouse, or not one that would mean a smart career move. Some of it was probably make work. And sometimes the value of second income was doubtful, because the cost of child care would eat a sizable chunk of it.

So it's as much the women's fault as Milo[s caron]evi[c acute]'s staying in power was my fault.