More and More Dads are Staying Home with the Kids

The number of stay-at-home Dads has doubled in the last 25 years, reaching a peak of 2.2 million in 2010, according to a new report by the Pew Research Center. And although the Great Recession contributed to a sharp uptick, by far, the fastest growing segment of at-home Dads say they’re home taking care of the kids because they want to be.

And they don’t want to be called Mr. Mom anymore. In fact, the growing At-Home Dad’s Network has been leading a campaign to get the term banished from the English language.

“Back in the 1980s, ‘Mr. Mom’ was a way to describe a man who was taking care of children, because that was seen as women’s work,” said Al Watts, president of the National At-Home Dad Network. “But now there’s been a great change in society. And there’s a great term for a guy who takes care of his kids. It’s ‘Dad.’”

And while at-home dads still face stigma – surveys show that society rewards at-home mothers, but still wonders why at-home fathers aren’t at work – Watts said his organization is taking that uneasiness about caregiving men head on: His organization has begun handing out “Man Cards” that read “As an actively involved dad, you are the manliest of men.”

Watts and his organization are part of the fast-growing share of dads who are staying home because that’s what they and their families have chosen. The new Pew Research Center report found that in 1989, only 5 percent of the 1.1 million at-home fathers said they were home to be primary caregivers. That share has increased four-fold now to 21 percent, a sign not only of the power of economics in reshaping traditional family structures, but of shifting gender norms.

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