)
As we have seen, when a couple decided to marry in the past, the husband was responsible for supporting the family, while the wife was responsible for the housework and childcare. Today, thanks to improvements in technology (which include running water and inexpensive store-bought food and clothing), housework takes up less time. Making use of the extra time, women have begun to work and support themselves. With the money they earn, they can afford to hire household help and pay for childcare. This frees up even more time, which they can dedicate to work. In parallel, the education system has improved, giving women the opportunity to train in many well-paying fields. Gradually women’s earnings have gone up, to the point that some of them now earn more than their husbands.
Despite these significant changes in women's financial and social status, what the ketuba requires of the husband is still important today, for two reasons. First, most families are still structured so the husband bears more responsibility for supporting the family, and the wife bears more responsibility for taking care of the home and the children. Second, when the ketuba requires the husband to support his wife, that is also for the children's sake. If he does not commit to her, there is a concern he might try to evade his parental obligation. Modern life has largely freed wives from economic dependence on their husbands, and freed husbands from domestic dependence on their wives. But this has damaged the stability of the nuclear family. A sizable number of children in the West grow up in one-parent families; their mother heads the household, and their father is not a presence in their lives. For this reason, it is crucial for a husband to take on financial responsibility for his wife when they marry. Of course, another benefit of the father’s presence is the education in family values, which is badly needed today, much more so than in the past.
Be that as it may, the change in women’s status gives rise to new questions about who is obliged to support the family, raise the children, and do the housework. These questions apply to all married couples (as well as divorced ones). The guiding principle for a couple trying to answer these new questions is to find something reasonable that works for both parties. (If a couple cannot resolve these issues, divorce is permitted, but society must encourage people to fight for their marriages and avoid hasty divorces.) Finding stability and balance is challenging, and it seems that as a society we are undergoing a period of experimentation while resolving some of the questions. This is similar to the process during the Second Temple period with regard to the ketuba. It went through a number of stages before it reached its final, balanced form.
