Having a fulltime career and raising kids can be a daunting job for both parents. However, for a working mother, these responsibilities come with a baggage of society’s expectations that weighs heavily on her choices. Although the American society has changed post Industrial Revolution, giving way to bourgeois life style; but there are certain aspects of modern life that are still over shadowed by prejudices of the past. One of them is the question raised on working mothers’ parenting abilities; to nurture and raise civilized and successful children.

Today, the United States alone has 75% of mothers working fulltime, of which some have raised famous and successful personalities. To name few ambitious and famous personalities raised by working moms; President Barack Obama, Leonardo DiCaprio, Martin King Luther Jr., George Washington, Thomas Jefferson among several others. These examples show that lives of children do not have to be any less great if they are brought up by working mothers.

Healthy children need to have tranquil and healthy surroundings, not just an ever present parent. The following statistics explain the best:

Numbers tell the story

In 1991, the National Institute of Child Health and Development revealed that mothers who worked full-time can afford to get the best childcare for their babies and in fact showed higher levels of sensitivity towards the needs of their child. According to researchers, this heightened level of sensitivity for the child may be the outcome of greater financial security.

There have been similar researches in late 1990s that have made following 

• Daughters of working mothers have higher academic achievement, greater career success, more nontraditional career choices, and greater occupations
• Children in poverty, in both two-parent and single-mother families, found higher cognitive scores for children with employed mothers as well as higher scores on socio-emotional indices.

More or less all the studies conducted on this subject over the years have proven that, financially secure mothers are more beneficial for the child than mothers who are struggling with their finances. It was also noted that children of working mothers tend to be high achievers and show lower levels of internalizing behaviors such as anxiety and depression.

Success stories in the making

The best explanation for these benefits can be that families with working moms have financial security, which leads to lower levels of stress and multiple opportunities of learning for their children. These benefits are not necessarily offered by families with stay-at-home moms, who could be dealing with stress of poverty and child-rearing challenges with little outside support.

So far hundreds of studies have been conducted on working mothers from different races, classes, and sexual orientations, and one thing that has been revealed every time is that quality time working mothers spent with their kids make up for the lost times. Also, if the child has a supportive network of friends, relatives and neighbors play a crucial role in bringing forth a confident, healthy and resourceful child.