2) How he sees his wife. One day many years ago, maybe he looked at her and thought: "Wow, she's amazing, I love her and want to spend the rest of my life with her.” Then added: “But obviously that love depends on maintaining the God-decreed pay disparity between my important manly job, and that silly part-time thing she is always wittering on about.”

That’s really the only way a man could be properly ashamed. Or maybe he doesn’t care, but is worried about what other people will say. Well, those people would be the sort who use phrases like “kept man”. And that is just the point. Try describing a stay-at-home mother as a 'kept woman' and see if she likes it. She’ll probably take a swing at you with her yoga mat. And quite rightly so. Anything that begins with the word 'kept' conveys the idea of ownership and servitude – hardly a glowing advertisement for the institution of marriage. So we shouldn’t say it about men any more than we should say it about women.

One half of a couple is always going to earn more than the other; whether it is the man or the woman should not be worthy of comment. No more than it is relevant who would win a game of one-on-one basketball. The real problem is that we are still having this discussion at all; that, consciously or not, many men still feel for some reason that they need to be the ones making the most cash. Maybe they should try spending a bit more time with children – or any other little animals that have no concept of money. They might enjoy it, and it certainly won’t be bad for their health.