GREEN PEACE

Marriages in which both partners work are increasingly common a fact which may in itself be a partial answer to why so many marriages also suffer from stress and run into trouble. A working husband and wife have much to offer each other apart from increased relief from financial pressures which a dual income brings; they will both have more to talk about apart from principal common interests like home and children. Very importantly, each partner will be aware of the kind of stress the other may undergo from time to time at work, by being able to identify with the problem through shared work experience. However, the stressful side of the dual career situation arises when work interferes with the quality of home life. Tired at the end of a working day, perhaps neither partner will have the inclination to talk or listen to each other, or their children; there is just not enough time or energy to enjoy being at home to the full.

Significantly, although career couples are expected to have more egalitarian values than those where the wife does not work, household tasks still tend to be unevenly distributed: it estimated that 65 percent of married women in Britain work. But recent survey indicates that 73 percent of women do nearly all the housework, and in equal division easily capable of turning into stressful issue. Stress between a husband and wife who both works can also become particularly acute if the work itself causes feelings of rivalry or resentment. This is a very common state of affairs if the if earns more than the husband, or if she has gone back to work or taken a job after a umber of years at home. Jobs change people, and new interests, contacts, and increased self confidence in a working wife may be reflected in feelings of inadequacy and insecurity in her husband.