Both parents “need” to work now because everyone tried to get ahead of one another back in the 60s and 70s. It started with one family on the block realizing that if mommy went to work and left the kids home to fend for themselves, they could afford a nicer house than everyone else. Once their neighbors saw how high they were living, they wanted in on the game too. Pretty soon everyone had two incomes, the prices of homes had been pushed higher, and we had a country full of kids raised by the TV.