Dads: show us your work
You're doing more at home than ever before. So this Father's Day, let's see it.
I must confess, I am not the half of The Joint Account who planned to write this week’s Father’s Day newsletter. But Douglas has fallen ill with something between a man cold and a summer virus, and so that he may rest his weary self in pursuit of a full recovery by Sunday, I would like to revisit my plea to our readers—particularly, you dads out there—from last June.
You are doing more at home than ever before. You are helping out more with care and household tasks, and you are spending more time with your kids.
Every time a dad makes caregiving more visible, he gives another man permission to imagine himself doing the same. So, let’s see it. Show the world your work.
I will never forget the year that Douglas became Swim Dad. In the first of many efforts to take greater initiative around our responsibilities that require true mental energy, he handled an entire swim season for Hazel from start to finish: buying her swimsuits, marking our calendars, organizing carpools, packing our bags for the meets. All I had to do was show up and cheer, because I knew he had it covered. I could fully let go.
The coolest part was watching his confidence soar as a parent. He stopped waiting for me to toss a task his way and just started doing. Of course, there are certain things that we will each always own (and my mental checklist might be longer so long as mothers are society’s default parent), but he is far from lost in a helpless abyss. He has fully stepped into his identity as a shared primary caregiver for our girls. He contributes to our family in these incredibly significant ways that go far beyond the money he earns, and he’s not afraid to show their teachers, our peers, our clients, or anyone else, where his priorities lie.
One of the core messages of our book is contributing to your family. This used to be a term reserved just for making money. But as we begin to understand the full physical, emotional, and mental load of parenting today, we owe ourselves and our partners a reframe that elevates the status of the time we spend caring for the people we love.
Caregivers are not babysitters. We are providers, whose time, energy, and love are critical investments into our family’s health, wealth, and wellness.
When you embrace the many ways you provide, you’re lending support for real-world policies solving the challenges that families face. Caregiving has long been treated as women’s work in part because women have been the ones most visibly associated with it. But the more men openly claim this part of their identity, the harder it becomes to dismiss caregiving as someone else’s responsibility.
Mothers can’t get us there by screaming into the void on our own (though we try…lord knows, we try). We need your partnership to drive cultural acceptance and change in the organizations and communities most resistant to it. That means showing up and showing off, even when it’s hard.
A perfect example is paid family leave. If you’re lucky, your state has put into place a paid program, mandatory protections, or an insurance offering that serves to replicate a portion of your salary. But federal law does not offer a single day of paid family leave. In all, the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics reported that only about 27 percent of private sector workers had access to paid family leave in 2023. That means nearly 3 in 4 workers did not.
However, we’re seeing near parity between dads and moms taking or seeking bonding leave in states with paid leave programs, according to a Paid Leave For All report. The trend is crystal clear when you compare data from the early days when just a few states, such as California and New Jersey, offered the first iteration of these programs. We’re talking about an increase from less than 20 percent of bonding claims being filed by dads to 30-to-55 percent in states offering it now. The net effect of seeing your colleagues and peers take advantage of their options cannot be ignored.
But what about in states with nothing? I’d argue that for families residing in those states, it’s even more important for men whose private employers offer paternity leave to take full advantage of it. Take all the time offered. Leaving the benefit unused or underutilized reinforces the point that families don’t need it—that mothers are doing just fine on their own. Putting a stake in the ground and using it says the opposite. It says that this should be the standard, not only at your organization but as a right for all families living where you live.
Of course, this extends well beyond the first months of your kids’ lives to caregiving openly throughout the years when your family needs you most. That means taking full advantage of flexible work options and asking for leniency as things come up. Your partner shouldn’t have to field every school-day emergency so that your boss can maintain his image of you as an unyielding male workerbot. That gender-dividing stereotype does nothing for anyone.
We talk a lot in women’s spaces about living a multi-hyphenate life. About our portfolio of responsibilities and diversified ambitions. Why not you, too?
You’ve got to let the people in your life—your managers, your buddies, your own father who might have his own ideas about what fatherhood should be—see it all. There’s so much to be proud of when you do things differently and hold yourself out to the world as a man who prioritizes his responsibilities as a parent and a partner. You can be a provider in more ways than one, and you have no idea how many lives you will impact by modeling those practices for others.
Some of the most valuable things you'll ever provide your family can't be measured on a paycheck at all.
These past few years, I’ve spent a lot of time with families. Some of them were beginning to figure it out, while others still had a lot to work on. Older parents looked back fondly, even at the hard times. Others were heartbroken to realize they won’t have more time.
I can assure you that no one looks back and wishes they put ten more hours a week into work. Not a single dad wishes he skipped bedtime. He doesn’t regret taking the longer walk to school. It’s quite the opposite.
We hold onto the ways we cared. And our kids will, too.
To all the dads, grandfathers, stepdads, and bonus dads: Happy Father’s Day. If you’re out there doing the work—taking paternity leave, packing lunches, doing pickups, doing hair, doing bedtime—we’d love to see it.
Share your caregiving moments with us. The more we make this work visible, the easier it becomes for the next dad to see himself in it, too.
Last month, I allowed Ruby to download the "Simply Draw: Learn to Draw” app. Because she's adorable and wasn't feeling well, I caved on upgrading her to the pro version for a whopping $15/mo. FWIW, the app is incredible and does a fantastic job teaching kids how to draw. But deep down, I knew she would stop using it as soon as she got better.
So I made her a deal: she could have a one-month subscription, and if she wasn't using it after 30 days, I would cancel it. Things like this can be a slippery slope, because it's so easy to forget you signed up for it, and then three months have gone by and you're $45 in the hole for an app your daughter doesn't even use. But not this time!
From the second I made her the deal, I set a reminder on my calendar for 30 days. Last week, when the 30 days were up, she was no longer using it, and I canceled the subscription. Instead of this becoming a financial trap, it was just a $15 activity while she was stuck at home. I’ll take it. -Douglas
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The content shared in The Joint Account does not constitute financial, legal, or any other professional advice. Readers should consult with their respective professionals for specific advice tailored to their situation. The information contained in this post is general in nature and for informational purposes only. It should not be considered as investment advice or as a recommendation of any particular strategy or investment product. This post is not a solicitation or an offer to buy or sell any specific security. Bone Fide Wealth cannot guarantee the accuracy of information from third parties.