“I think actually admitting that there is no work-life balance is the first step to getting there in a way because it’s just not possible,” Johansson—best known for her role as Black Widow in the Marvel franchise—told CBS Sunday Morning.

The actress said there will almost always be a “deficit” somewhere, whether at work or at home—and over time, she’s learned to accept that not everything can be done perfectly.

“I’ve learned to be more kind to myself in that way. You can’t do all of these things all the time,” Johansson said. “There’s just like, ‘Is it good enough?’”

As Scarlett Johansson has taken on more roles in her life, including launching a skincare brand, raising two children (born in 2014 and 2021), and balancing a marriage—she said her definition of success has evolved. As a parent in particular, she said it means doing what’s right, even if it doesn’t always make her the “most popular.”

“Somebody once told me, ‘If you’re successful as a parent like 75% of the time, that’s good—if you’re doing 75% of it like right, then you’re winning, which is probably true,” Johansson said.

Scarlett Johansson grew up on food stamps—and now she’s one of the highest-paid Hollywood stars

Johansson was the fourth-highest paid actor in 2025, behind Adam Sandler, Tom Cruise, and Mark Wahlberg, according to Forbes. Her net worth is about $165 million, estimates Celebrity Net Worth. 

But growing up in Manhattan in a family of six, she has said money was often tight during her childhood. In a 2017 interview with Entertainment Tonight, she recalled her family relying on welfare and food stamps to get by.

By age nine, Johansson had already begun acting, landing her first role in the 1994 Rob Reiner-directed comedy, North. Her rise to stardom accelerated with films like Lost in Translation, Marriage Story, and a string of Marvel blockbusters culminating in the 2021 standalone film Black Widow.

Beyond acting, Johansson has also occasionally used her platform for public and political advocacy, including longstanding support for feminism and women’s rights, as well as canvassing against the reelection of President Donald Trump.

Her career has even pulled her into the center of debates around artificial intelligence. In 2024, Johansson publicly accused OpenAI and CEO Sam Altman of using a voice for the company’s chatbot that sounded strikingly similar to her own after she declined to participate in the project. 

Many top performers agree: work-life balance isn’t always possible

Johansson isn’t alone in questioning whether true work-life balance exists—even as it’s become a top motivator for job seekers. Many high achievers have echoed the same sentiment: succeeding at the highest level often comes with tradeoffs.

Emma Watson, best known for playing Hermione Granger in the Harry Potter series, said the intense demands of filmmaking made balance feel nearly unattainable as she grew up in the spotlight.

“I just used to completely sacrifice myself for whatever the thing was I was trying to achieve,” Watson said on the On Purpose podcast last year. 

“Making films, the hours on them are so demanding, that to have your own life alongside that, to have that balance is almost impossible.”

That same mentality extends beyond Hollywood. Emma Grede, the CEO of Good American and a founding partner of Skims, argued that extraordinary success inevitably requires extraordinary effort.

“If you are leading an extraordinary life, to think that extraordinary effort wouldn’t be coupled to that somehow is crazy,” Grede said on The Diary of a CEO podcast in 2025.

If it’s possible to have true work-life balance, she continued, “tell me who she is, and I’ll show you a liar.”

Even former President Barack Obama has admitted that having a balanced work and life will not always be possible.

Speaking on The Pivot Podcast last year, he said: “If you want to be excellent at anything—sports, music, business, politics—there’s going to be times of your life when you’re out of balance, where you’re just working and you’re single-minded.”

The S&P 500 (^GSPC 0.16%) fell sharply in March when the Iran conflict pushed oil prices above $100 per barrel for the first time since 2022. The index has already recovered its losses, but the rebound may have been premature.

Geopolitical tensions are still elevated, energy prices are still increasing, and no one knows when the situation will improve. Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell said as much during a recent press conference: “The economic outlook remains highly uncertain and the conflict in the Middle East has added to this uncertainty.”

Meanwhile, Fed officials recently warned that inflationary pressure could lead to interest rate hikes, and the S&P 500 just sounded an alarm last witnessed during the dot-com crash. Here’s what investors need to know about the current market environment.

The Federal Reserve says inflationary pressure could lead to interest rate hikes

The Federal Reserve’s biannual financial stability report identifies and assesses risks to the U.S. financial system. The latest report was released in May 2026, and it ranked geopolitical tension and elevated oil prices as the most pressing concerns.

“Inflationary pressure from an energy shock could force central banks to tighten monetary policy even if economic growth were to weaken,” warned the Fed Board of Governors. That could be particularly bad in the current environment because stocks already trade at very rich valuations by historical standards.

Under normal circumstances, the Fed would cut rates to stimulate a weak economy. But inflation accelerated substantially in March due to soaring energy prices caused by the Iran conflict, and inflation may continue climbing as the oil shock drives up manufacturing and transportation costs. In that scenario, the Fed may be forced to raise its benchmark rate.

That could sink the stock market in several ways. Higher interest rates would hurt corporate earnings, both directly by increasing interest expense and indirectly by reducing consumer demand. Higher interest rates would also make bonds more attractive, which could cause investors to sell stocks.

Historical context is valuable here. The Federal Reserve’s last rate-hike cycle started on March 17, 2022, and the S&P 500 fell 17% in the next three months. In fact, the Fed has initiated four rate-hike cycles since 1999, and the S&P 500 has always declined over the next three months, with an average drawdown of 7%.

The stock market sounds an alarm last seen during the dot-com crash

The cyclically adjusted price-to-earnings (CAPE) ratio, sometimes called the Shiller PE, is a valuation metric used to evaluate entire stock market indexes. As of early May, the S&P 500 had a CAPE ratio of 39.6. Excluding the last few months, the index has not traded at such a high valuation since the dot-com crash in September 2000.

In fact, the S&P 500’s average CAPE ratio has only exceeded 39 during 27 months since its creation in 1957. In other words, the S&P 500 (a benchmark for the U.S. stock market) has only been this expensive about 3% of the time in the last 70 years, and such rich valuations have historically correlated with dismal future returns.

The chart below shows the S&P 500’s average return over different time periods following a monthly CAPE reading above 39.

Data source: Robert Shiller.

Here is what the chart above suggests about the future: If the S&P 500’s returns match the historical average, the index will fall 4% by May 2027. It will drop 20% by May 2028. And it will plummet 30% by May 2029.

Should investors sell their stocks right now? No. Past performance is never a guarantee of future results. The CAPE ratio is based on the S&P 500’s average inflation-adjusted earnings from the past 10 years. And earnings could grow faster in the future as artificial intelligence boosts productivity. In that case, the S&P 500 may keep moving higher while its CAPE ratio falls to something more reasonable.

However, while it doesn’t make sense to exit the stock market simply because the S&P 500’s CAPE ratio is near the upper end of its historical range, it would be equally foolish to dismiss the stock market’s rich valuation. In the current environment, investors should only buy high-conviction stocks they would be comfortable holding through a steep downturn, and only if shares trade at reasonable prices.

I’ll end with advice from Warren Buffett. “Your goal as an investor should simply be to purchase, at a rational price, a part interest in an easily understandable business whose earnings are virtually certain to be materially higher five, 10, and 20 years from now.”