Clay 1

Emily Clay
Professor Fielding
WRTC 103 Section 30
11 October 2015
Should Stay-At-Home Mothers Be Paid?
The issue on whether stay-at-home mothers should be paid is a rising controversial topic.
The number of women that decide to stop working and stay home with their children after giving
birth continues to increase. When women decide to stay-at-home, they forgo a salary, but they
are still working hard in order to raise our future generations. Ruth Graham is the author of the
article Women Should Not Be Financially Compensated for Child-Rearing which is found in
Are Women Paid Fairly? in 2013. She writes about her opposing viewpoints to the interview
that Wendy Luhabe gives in April, 2012 with CNN. Emily Clay constructed a PSA that supports
the claim that stay-at-home mothers should be paid. The PSA could be published in a magazine
whose audience is parents or on commercials persuading adults to give to the women who work
hard to raise the future generations. The rhetoric of Ruth Grahams Women Should Not Be
Financially Compensated for Child-Rearing relies on logos and ethos and Emily Clays PSA
poster relies heavily on pathos to compare the view points on whether stay-at-home mothers
should be paid.
In Ruth Grahams article Women Should Not Be Financially Compensated for ChildRearing, Graham is disagreeing with a statement by Wendy Luhabe who says that stay-at-home
mothers should receive a mommy salary. The authors targeted audience is mothers and soon
to be mothers. She is stating that if you choose to stay-at-home with your children, then that is
your choice and you should not expect someone to pay you. Grahams article makes her point

Clay 2
and is topical and controversial to people who agree with Wendy Luhabe. The article is split into
sections separated by subheadings which separates it by claims and defending the different
claims. The writer supports her claim that stay-at-home mothers should not be paid by giving
supporting details that it is the mothers choice to quit her job and raise her children. No one is
forcing her to do that, so she should not be paid because it is her choice. Graham gives the
example that in 2010, she left her job in order to travel around the United States (Graham P.8).
When she made this choice, she never expected someone to pay her for her to do what she
wanted. She thinks that every job has a salary and benefits and when you decide to stay-at-home,
you give up a salary but you have huge benefits.
The author, Ruth Graham, uses ethos in her article to support her claim that stay-at-home
mothers should not be paid. One credible source that she uses is an interview of Wendy Luhabe
in 2012 on CNN (Graham P.2). Ruth Graham also cites another source in her article that is in the
Onion piece that is titled Women Now Empowered By Everything A Woman Does that Lisa
Simpson shouts I choose my choice! (P.5). The piece in Onion states that women are now
empowered to do anything they want to do. They should have reproductive rights and
workplace equality (P.5). The author also uses confidence when stating that the mommy
salary proposal also validates the notion that money is the only reward worth working for
(P.2). The author validates the point that the stay-at-home mothers are only concerned about the
money they are making. Most mothers should be happy with the benefits of staying at home and
watching your children go through every step of life. Although Graham uses credible sources,
she does not seem to be a highly credible journalist and editor.
Ruth Graham also uses logos in the article to support her claim. Her first claim of
comparison used is based on facts about, jobs have salaries and benefits and how when you

Clay 3
choose to be a stay-at-home mom, you forgo a salary for enormous benefits (Graham P.7). The
author says that the benefits you have are being with your children for a majority of their first
years of life and watching them go through all their mild stones like their first words and taking
their first steps. An observation that the author made was that if you have high benefits, like
being with your child for most of their childhood, then you should not mind going without the
salary that you once had. Another claim that the author uses is based on a statistic, according to
a study released Monday, womenonce empowered primarily via the assertion of reproductive
rights or workplace equality with menare now empowered by virtually everything the typical
woman does (P.5). Graham is claiming that women do not have to go by a standard anymore
and that women can do what they want. Women should not feel like they need to stay-at-home
because that is what past generations have done.
Pathos is also used to support the claims in the article that Ruth Graham wrote. The
author is trying to convince the audience that stay-at-home mothers should not be paid. The
article can be viewed as cruel to some mothers that read it. Graham is harsh when giving certain
claims that do not give enough credit to most mothers that work very hard to raise children. An
example of pathos that Graham uses is from Wendy Luhabes interview with CNN. Luhabe feels
that stay-at-home mothers should be paid in some type of because raising a child is probably the
most important contributions that the world should be valuing (Graham P.2). Compared to most
claims that Graham has made, she actually agrees with Luhabes statement that raising children
is an important job. Another claim that Graham made, that most of the audience most likely
disagrees with is, maybe someday well conjure up some sort of utopian alternate universe in
which everyone is handed cash for walking down the street simply because we deserve money
for any decision we make (P.6). Her claim is harsh towards mothers because she acts like stay-

Clay 4
at-home mothers have a relaxing life, staying at home all day, when really they are working hard
to raise the future generations. It may be a mothers choice on whether they will stay-at-home
with their children, but they are not doing it to watch TV and sleep in everyday. After reading
this article, most of the audience has probably come to the conclusion that the author, Ruth
Graham, does not have her own children. The claim that the audience has to ask themselves is,
do you want to work an eight hour a day job with a salary and barely be able to see you children,
or do you want to give up the salary and be able to see you children almost all day for the first
years of their lives (P.9). Graham believes that mothers need to ask themselves that important
question because if you choose to stay-at-home then you should not be paid because you will
have amazing benefits.

The
audience of

Emily Clays PSA is claiming that stay-at-home mothers should

be paid for their work. The author is implying that raising kids
is not as easy as it seems and they should receive financial help.

intended
Emily

Clays PSA are

mothers

or adults who

would be

Clay 5
able to help these stay-at-home mothers that are in need. The PSA had images, statistics, and lots
of color that would stand out in a magazine or internet article. The poster is catchy to the eye but
it does not look professional. The tone of the poster is persuading so the audience will help the
the stay-at-home moms. The creator of the PSA is not credible. She has little background on the
topic except for what she has observed. Also, she is not a mother so it is hard for her to have a
strong background.
The creator uses ethos to create her reputation for her audience. At the bottom of the
poster she uses a credible website, www.momsclub.org. She also cites the website that she got her
statistics from. It seems that the creators only qualifications are in designing the PSA poster. Her
PSA is requesting money to financially help the stay-at-home mothers that do not have working
husbands. Since the website is a non-profit, you can assume that all the money is going to the
right places.
The creator uses logos in her PSA to encourage people to help stay-at-home mothers. She
uses multiple statistics to support her claims. One of the statistics that helps support the claim is
that 60% of children are better off with a stay-at-home parent (Wang). The PSA is supporting
this because the creator wants more mothers to be able to stay at home with their children
because it is a more beneficial environment. Another one of Clays statistics says Only 20% of
the 29% stay-at-home moms in 2012 had husbands that worked (Wang). The PSA is helping to
support the other 9% of stay-at-home moms who probably are not making any money because
they do not have husbands. The creator also gives another statistic that most stay-at-home moms
are younger than 35 and do not have a high school diploma (Wang). Clay is including these
statistics in the PSA so that more people will donate to the non-profit organization to help these

Clay 6
stay-at-home mothers still pay for their children. The PSAs statistics make the point but they are
not arranged in the best order.
Pathos is another rhetorical device used in the PSA poster. The creators purpose is using
pathos to try and make you feel sorry for some of the stay-at-home moms and be encouraged to
donate money. The visual is eye catching, but just very busy. One of the pictures on the poster is
of a group of moms walking with their babies. The moms look happy and relaxed because they
do not have to work. The poster is trying to say that in reality, being a stay-at-home mother is not
that easy. Another picture that is on the poster is a crying baby. For most people, pictures of
babies are emotional. This baby picture makes certain members of the audience sad because the
baby is upset. The PSA poster also had a picture of a hand holding coins. It represents that stayat-home mothers should be financially compensated, and that money is highly valued over the
world so even mothers should receive some. The creator did a good job in displaying different
emotions and encouraging the audience to donate to the stay-at-home mothers.
Ruth Grahams article and Emily Clays PSA both used logos, ethos, and pathos to
explain their different points of view on if stay-at-home mothers should receive financial
compensation. The verbal argument is opposed to paying the stay-at-home mothers to be paid for
staying at home and the PSA wants the audience to help the mothers receive financial
compensation. Both viewpoints agree that raising a child is one of the most important
contributions to the world and it should be highly value. The verbal argument is the more
convincing point of view because it has stronger statistics and better claims. Reading the article
and the PSA poster, the audience received knowledgeable facts on both points of view so they
can make their own logical opinion whether stay-at-home mothers should receive financial
compensation.

Clay 7

Works Cited
Graham, Ruth. "Women Should Not Be Financially Compensated for Child-Rearing." Are
Women Paid Fairly?, 2013. Web. 7 Oct. 2015.
Wang, Wendy, and Gretchen Livingston. "After Decades of Decline, A Rise in Stay-at-Home
Mothers." Pew Research Centers Social Demographic Trends Project RSS. 8 Apr. 2014.
Web. 8 Oct. 2015.