When you look at the market value of the labor the homemaker does for the household, and consider that it accrues tax-free, the financial benefits are considerable. And there are also substantial tax benefits to married filing jointly when one spouse has no taxable income. For the arrangement to be successful though, the "working" spouse needs to fully recognize the value provided to the household and make sure it's well compensated, both emotionally and financially. If you can do that, it works extremely well.

Of course, you gotta know each other really well to talk about it. I would not talk about that to everyone, because some (male childless thinking about it) collegues looked shocked when I just hinted.

When our second kid was born, my wife and I mutually agreed it made sense for her to be a stay-at-home mom. The flexibility to run errands and take kids to appointments is incredible. Logistically, I don't know how we would have survived with both of us working.

But it has been a very difficult emotional transition for her. Much of her identity was based on her profession (she was a teacher) and a chunk of her self worth came from knowing she was financially independent. It's working out OK, but it's one of the biggest life transitions she's gone through.

For an extreme example, consider a battered spouse who is afraid to leave because they have no financial independence. Even with alimony and such, the stay-at-home spouse takes on a lot of risk.

However, two working parents with young kids is a very difficult endeavor, so I can definitely see the appeal of one parent having time and flexibility!

Until the nest empties, and they have no retirement funds or worthwhile employment options to speak of. If the breadwinner turns out to be more of a jerk than realized amidst the business of raising children, and maybe the homemaker learns by this time they've actually been exploited as a low-cost servant all this time, expected to continue in that capacity until death, then it can start feeling like a very raw deal all too late, now feeling trapped in it as well.

A good friend's parents went through this, it was a few years of family crisis with the homemaker living with relatives wanting a divorce while she slowly had to accept there's effectively no other option financially; go home and sleep in the bed you didn't realize you were making.

Kids are a very effective diversion for setting this trap, men have been doing this to women for ages. At least now women can get jobs and delay having kids until after a career with some retirement savings and marketable skills development.

Unfortunately even in my family, my mother, who was forced to have some big career gaps due to 3 kids, had a much lower pension compared to my father and my father considered it to be "fair" that each spends its own pension and split the bills equally. :(

Until the kids grow and you get into a really vulnerable position. No job, less skills, no retirement funds, less connections and more dependent on your spouse (which sometimes can easily forget you sacrificed your career)

There's one or two posting almost every day on /r/parenting. Usually because she has a small kid or two and a husband who doesn't help with the kids or housework.

My wife is currently finishing her third year at home and there will be at least two more.