If there is a riddle that affluent, working parents can’t seem to solve, it is how to balance the many interests competing for their time: work, children, spouses, their own needs and wants. Yes, they have more money than most people struggling to get by in similar situations, but any help or financial freedom they have is dependent on their continuing to work and set priorities.

This group’s struggles are back in the cultural conversation. Anne-Marie Slaughter, the former dean of the Woodrow Wilson School at Princeton University and a senior State Department official during Hillary Rodham Clinton’s tenure, touched a nerve three years ago when she wrote about the continued difficulty of women balancing office and home life. Now she has written a book, “Unfinished Business: Women Men Work Family,” that calls for changes in the workplace to accommodate careers and child care.

In a bit of calendar syncing, Ms. Slaughter’s husband, Andrew Moravcsik, a professor at Princeton, has added his side, with an essay in the current issue of The Atlantic magazine about his role as the “lead parent” to their two children while his wife was in Washington and then on the speaking circuit after her essay made her even busier. He put his wife’s career before his and has no regrets.

But the message is clear: Being high achievers isn’t easy.

Their writings, along with that of Sheryl Sandberg, the chief operating officer of Facebook and the author of “Lean In,” serve as the Let’s Go travel guides to the high-octane life. But those travel guides offer clear tips on what to see and skip. There is no simple guide for couples making decisions on the fly. Money and relationships are at stake.

What are the tricks affluent couples have learned to make it all work?

(A pause here: Parents with inflexible jobs or who are paid by the hour with no sick time would surely relish the challenge of choosing among high-quality day care, a nanny or one parent working from home to meet child care needs. They have it tougher than people I’m writing about here.)