Ann Crittenden's life changed dramatically in 1982: Her son was born. However, she didn't realize exactly how much it had changed until a stranger walked up to her at a party in New York and said, "Didn't you used to be Ann Crittenden?"

"It was at this moment that I knew I had to write this book," recalls Crittenden. Crittenden enjoyed a tremendous career as a reporter for Fortune, Newsweek and then The New York Times. When her son was born, she either had to compromise her time with him by working 10 hours a day, or give up her position at The Times all together. And give it up she did.

"You can't have a family life with both parents working full time in a 24/7 economy," says Crittenden. She made the decision to put her son before her career because, essentially, there were no other options for mothers. And, according to Crittenden, they are still all too few.

A Call to Action
"The feminist movement has dropped the ball on this issue," says Crittenden. "There needs to be a call to action for mothers. The movement liberated women, but not mothers."

Crittenden says that full-time working mothers are viewed as neglecting their children, while mothers who stay at home are accused of lying around all day eating bon bons. For a society that touts the benefits of hands-on mothering, Crittenden says it has yet to put its money where its mouth is and value the work that all mothers are doing.

In her book, The Price of Motherhood: Why the Most Important Job in the World is Still the Least Valued (Owl Books, 2002), Crittenden presents the results of years of research on economic inequality of motherhood and its value, or lack thereof, to the American society.

"When I became a mother, I couldn't believe how much of a challenge it was," says Crittenden. "It takes wisdom, patience, character, part-teacher, part-counselor, part-manager and all the other skills that make up a highly skilled labor force. Can you believe I actually had someone say to me, 'Of all the couples we know, you're the only woman who doesn't work?'"

These sentiments are at the heart of The Price of Motherhood -- and at the heart of many women today, according to Crittenden. Her exposure to economic disparity didn't begin when she became a mother; she had much experience with this issue as a young reporter.

How It All Started
Crittenden was born and raised in Dallas, Texas, and completed her undergraduate work at Southern Methodist University. From there, she headed to New York for graduate studies at Columbia University. As the 1960s came to a close, Crittenden left the world of academia and plunged into the world of journalism. "I had been in libraries and studying for so long, I was ready to get out there and do something," she says. She landed her first job at Fortune Magazine – and that was just the beginning. It was then that Crittenden got her first taste of bringing women's issues to the forefront.

She was hired as a researcher for Fortune because of her gender. Men were writers; women were researchers. According to Crittenden, the lines were clearly drawn and there was no room for women to advance. The female journalists of the time tired of this treatment and filed two class-action lawsuits: one against Time, Inc. (Fortune, Time Life and Sports Illustrated) and the other against Newsweek. Their demand was simple: Allow men and women alike to be considered for both the researchers and writers positions, as well as earn promotions. The women triumphed.

Crittenden wasted no time in taking advantage of the ruling. She showed up at Newsweek magazine just as it was hiring the first wave of women writers. Crittenden also flew through the window of opportunity with The New York Times as it was looking to hire female reporters in 1975. "I was treated like one of the boys at The Times," recalls Crittenden.

After giving up her position with The Times, Crittenden began to write as a freelancer from home. Due to her experience as an economics journalist, and her interest in child-rearing issues with her newfound role, Crittenden began to notice a pattern – and started putting facts together. After six years of research, hundreds of interviews and countless frequent flyer miles, The Price of Motherhood was born.

"... I realized how little my former world seemed to understand, or care, about the complex reality I was discovering," writes Crittenden in her book. "The dominant culture of which I had been a part considered childrearing unskilled labor, if it considered childrearing at all. And no one was stating the obvious: If human abilities are the ultimate fount of economic progress, as many economists now agree, and if those abilities are nurtured (or stunted) in the early years, then mothers and other caregivers of the young are the most important producers in the economy. They do have, literally, the most important job in the world."

Crittenden's message has many dimensions. She stresses that mothers are obviously disadvantaged in the work place due to an "all or nothing" attitude by employers, as well as the research she uncovered that indicates women make only 59 percent of men's earnings. Unfortunately, Crittenden found this inequality in other institutions as well, like marriage – and divorce.

"Moreover, in many courts of law, it is still considered unnatural for a wife and mother to claim a material reward for her labors on behalf of the family," Crittenden writes. "This makes wives the only workers in the economy expected to work for no remuneration, which is obviously why women as a group are still so much poorer than men."

Crittenden asserts that because caring for one's children is a loving and moral obligation, society in general views it as appalling to attach a price tag to motherhood. She argues that our courts apparently uphold this notion. "Family law doesn't consider raising a family equal to making money," she says. Arguments abound surrounding the economic lives of homemakers. A common statement is that if a wife has children and stays home with them, "it is her choice."

"But mothers' choices are not made in a vacuum," Crittenden counters in her book. "They are made in a world that women never made, according to the rules they didn't write. To take just one example, what many mothers really want is a good part-time job, yet there is no rich and vibrant part-time labor market in the United States; as one observer has commented, we have many more choices in breakfast cereals than we do in work arrangements." This is the very reason Crittenden walked the path of stay-at-home motherhood. There were simply no part-time jobs open to her in journalism.

With the research and revelations in her book, Crittenden hopes to raise the consciousness of all types of mothers. She made the decision to stay at home with her son, but different women are going to make different decisions. Her goal is to have the options for mothers opened to them so their career vs. motherhood choice doesn't have to be like hers – all or nothing.

"We don't need to focus on what we should do [full-time career vs. full-time mothering], but no matter what you do, the work is not getting recognized," says Crittenden. Research indicates that working mothers put in 80 to 100 hours a week between their careers and child rearing.

While Crittenden was freelancing and working on The Price of Motherhood, her teenage son quipped, "You have such a pathetic life, just sitting in front of the computer." But as Crittenden's book was published and began earning rave reviews, her son's tune changed as he saw the fruits of her labor. He then told her, "You worked so hard and it paid off. I'm so proud of you!"

A lesson of a lifetime from mother to son. Priceless.