'I Think the Time is Ripe'

SOCIOLOGIST Arlie Hochschild says she hopes her book Second Shift can help the current generation of college students live happy married lives. "I would like the book to be a rescue operation in a way," she says. "Many of the young people I talk to are bright and engaging...but are not brilliant about [future marriage problems]. They are denying the difficulties ahead."

"If you are 22, [parenthood is] probably not that far away. Eighty percent of men and women have children sometime, and the vast majority of women have kids before 30."

These new mothers and fathers will lead happier lives if they share housework, says Hochschild. But working parents who want to share the work at home face the obstacle of a corporate America that reserves the most important jobs for full-time-plus workers.

"What it would take is a renewal of the feminist movement, this time fully involving men whose interests are every bit as much at stake," she says. "I think this could be done. The last movement made enormous changes in people's lives...[and] I think the time is ripe. I think corporations are on the verge of making these reforms."

Hochschild calls on students to demand maternity and paternity leaves, part-time jobs on the career ladder and child care. She calls for "organized pressure on places of work," unions and political leaders.

"Men are as much affected by this as women are. It comes out in sexuality, it comes out in tone of voice, it comes out in expressions of love," she said.

"I wouldn't make it a man versus woman thing. It isn't. It's corporations and government versus the new two-job family."