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arabian · #1 04-02-2019, 08:29 AM

I came across this article today.

https://www.cbc.ca/news/business/wom...ings-1.5079732.

Extrapolate this information into a situation where a couple were married for several years and then separated.

Determining Spousal Support is a topic that comes up frequently on our forum.

I believe that this information would apply whether the stay-at-home parent/care-giver were male or female.

iona6656 · #2 04-02-2019, 09:10 AM

completely agree with this. Nowhere is this more obvious than in the legal field. The mean age of women having children in the legal field is much MUCH higher. I was 36 with my first, and both of my good friends and colleagues that I used to work with were around that age- and had their second around 38/39...you basically rush to get those kids in before 40.

The reason for this "advanced age" is that you have to work to build your reputation before you go blow it up and have kids. If you don't want your income to tank- you better be ready to go back in less than 6 months. And I'm talking government public sector lawyers- the implications in private practice are much worse.

The "cost" for me is that I pretty much gave up advancing in my career for the next 3-5 years- and that comes with a reduction of what I could be earning by about 30K. When I was looking to move from the last place I worked- I didn't even consider applying to Senior Solicitor positions in government (v. just a regular associate) because I don't have the time to devote to it. I have less now as a single mom.

It's fairly obvious when you look at the senior solicitors/ regional solicitors in the municipal sector. There are women in the positions for sure- but they're on average- about 10-15 years older than their male counterparts.

edit- IF I was to go to trial- I would want to advance the argument that I was economically disadvantaged by marriage- and the pause I took for mat leave. I would want to. But I wouldn't.

ifonlyihadknown · #3 04-02-2019, 09:47 AM

So the data from the article seems to imply that the "wage" gap is actually a "child" gap.

Janus · #4 04-02-2019, 02:14 PM

No, it's a weird graph. It compares earnings of women who had children to women who did not have children. It makes no comparisons between men and women at all.

So, for men at all ages, having children makes their income higher.

For women who had their first child at the age of 30, their income suffers for a bit, and then recovers and ends up better than if they had no kids.

For women who had their first child younger than 30, their income suffers, and never recovers. Well, 7 years later it has almost recovered.

Correlational data is tricky. Taken at face value, it would imply that there should be little to no spousal support for women who have their first kid after the age of 30, since the child actually on average increased their income

. I feel there are likely some uncontrolled variables here. For example, women who don't have kids might have higher levels of medical issues making them less employable. Trying to pull a causal link from this data is a mistake.

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