A qualifying E spouse may work incident to valid E status with appropriate evidence, but the principal still needs to establish the principal’s own investor eligibility and development-and-direction role.
Do not replace one person’s requirements with another’s work
Explain the intended division of business responsibilities honestly. Confirm the spouse’s actual status, dates and relevant I-94 evidence before work. An eligible unmarried child under 21 may seek dependent status but does not acquire the spouse’s work authorization merely by helping the family business.
The principal is in a different position: because the requirement is to develop and direct the enterprise, a principal working full time elsewhere raises an obvious question about who is running the business. If the spouse wants a principal E-2 claim, independently test treaty nationality, ownership of 50 percent or more, or genuine operational control, and responsibility to develop and direct the enterprise. Discuss any independent employment plans and the children's future status questions explicitly, rather than assuming a shared business plan settles the whole household's arrangements. Children under twenty-one may live and study but never work, and because E-2 offers no direct path to permanent residence, a child who reaches twenty-one loses derivative status entirely.