Alissa Quart Quotes

There's a motherhood penalty because we've been long taught things that are stigmatized about motherhood. As workers, we don't want to talk about our kids at work. We're afraid to, or that when we leave at 5:30 to relieve the sitter we're somehow going to be diminished.

Mothers suffer in the workplace. That fact is by now so painfully familiar it even has a name: the motherhood penalty.

I'm one of the lucky few who never had to face the whole 'Oh, you've had a baby, and now work will have to suffer' bit. It just wasn't a big deal when I got married and had a baby.

Women face enough pressures and challenges in a workplace that is still depressingly biased against a female's success. Add to that, the fact that the very thing many women I know find most rewarding (having kids) is now frowned upon.

I think obviously we need to work harder at extending the women's movement. How do women who have prepared for careers and have a child get back to the workplace and still fulfill maternal roles?

There's also, I think more so in the music business and especially for women, this ceiling that people put on you if you have children or a family and decide to spend time with them.

At an ERA fundraiser years ago, one of my favorite buttons was the one that said, 'Every mother is a working mother.'

I think, in all fields, there's this motherhood pay penalty where, the second you become a mother - and this is true whether you give birth or adopt - you're perceived to not be as committed to your job. Whereas men are perceived as breadwinners who now need more money and promotions because they're fathers.

Take motherhood: nobody ever thought of putting it on a moral pedestal until some brash feminists pointed out, about a century ago, that the pay is lousy and the career ladder nonexistent.

You can't be a great mum and work the whole time necessarily; those two things aren't ideal. We have an awful lot to work on and to debate about in relation to our working lives, because it isn't working for a lot of people, particularly for a lot of women.

Working mothers do an hour more per day than working fathers do and working mothers do on average an hour more per day with the kids than working fathers do.

I want to abolish tags like 'comeback' and 'retirement' that are used to define every married female actor. What is the big deal? In Hollywood, every top actor takes a break, has children, and gets back to work.

I am not a pregnant working mother wronged.

Young men keep telling me they don't 'have it all' either. And they may have a point. But if you define 'having it all' as the opportunity to have a successful career and a family, I'd say this. When a man tells his coworkers he's going to have a child, no one asks him how he'll manage or if he'll be coming back to work.

Most female CEOs have been more understanding than their male counterparts, of the stress that new mothers experience to 'do it all,' which often means, 'all by themselves.' Why? They've been there. They understand the policies needed to keep women in the workforce.

Some women work while they are pregnant, but not me. That was a choice I had made. That's when I took a break. Men can work at whatever stage they are; whether they turn daddy, they still have their own thing. But women can't afford that because by being mothers, they have to be there for their kids.

If the feminist program goes to pieces on the arrival of the first baby, it's false and useless.

I wanted to write about women and their work, and about valuing the work we, as women, choose to do. Too many women I knew disparaged their work. Many working mothers thought they ought to be home with their children instead, so they carried around too much guilt to enjoy much job satisfaction.

The transparency men have enjoyed for generations, about their ability to frankly work while also reveling in fatherhood, is still complicated for women. Which is not to say that anyone can have everything.

It would be a tragic mistake for Congress ever to adopt any public or tax policy which encourages mothers to assign child care to others and enter the labor force.

Literally, over a weekend, Friday to Monday, I went from a C.I.A. officer to changing diapers and putting the kid in a Bjorn and going to the playground and hanging out with all the nannies. I was the only dad - everyone kind of gave me strange looks because of our sexist society.

When there are good postings available, the people who choose who is to come to that particular position, they will always have, at the back of their minds, a fear that, 'If I take a woman, she might prioritize her family over the job and, therefore, not be available at times when her presence is required.'

I am no different from so many professionals who go on maternity leave only towards the end of their pregnancy.

Compared to some of our neighbours, it's not frowned upon to be a mother and work in France.

Every time I sit down with a powerful working mom, I wrestle with whether to ask the 'mom question.' I don't want to be part of perpetuating a double standard by asking women in business a question that men are not asked.