A poll - should partner working fewer hours do more housework?

[TheBerry]

Person A and Person B contribute equally financially to the household and currently earn about the same. However, Person A works longer hours. Person A also historically earns more and is likely to earn more again in the future.

Person B does a bit more childcare.

Should Person B be more responsible for cooking and chores? Or should they be allowed to relax in their downtime, and cooking/chores split equally?

YABU - Person B should be doing more cooking and more chores, since they have more free time.

YANBU - the cooking and chores should be split equally, and Person B shouldn’t have to do more just because they work fewer hours.

How many more hours does Person A work and how many more hours of childcare does person B do?

Depends what B is doing while A is working.

Ideally free time should be equal.

Depends on the age of the child. If they’re very little and childcare is very hands on, then that is person B’s share of the family ‘work’. If the child is older and more self sufficient person B should probably do a bit more cooking and chores so the family ‘work’ is more evenly spread.

It completely depends how much childcare and how much difference in hours worked.

This is always going to depend on specific details and circumstances. How physically/mentally demanding are the jobs, does either have a particularly gruelling (or particularly nice eg sitting down on an empty train without kids) commute. Ultimately I think in relationships it should be “from each according to his ability” rather than an exact split.

Of course. Both of you should have equal amounts of working time and downtime from work, whether that work is paid work or household work.

Currently DH is working on a piece of code that his business needs to have fixed asap, so I’m doing laundry, batch cooking a curry and cleaning the kitchen. When I was working long hours for most of last month because my company was closing a deal, the roles were reversed and DH kept the household cogs turning. That’s how a partnership should be and we’ve never even spoken about it, let alone argued over it. It just silently happens.

The YANBU option is more reasonable if your are just flatmates but in a cohesive family then everyone getting equal downtime is more important in my view.

When I worked PT, I saw my working hours as the same as DH's so yes. I'd get the chores done while he was at work so that we could have down time together when he was home.

Both people should end up with equal leisure time

They should have equal free time childcare counts as 'work' unless the kids are relatively independent.

It really depends on what B is doing with the extra time, and also if they have young children and how old the children are…

You should have equal working hours - whether that’s paid work, housework, childcare. If someone is at home a lot of the time with kids, or working from home with a protected lunch break, I’d expect them to be able to wrap a certain amount of housework in that, but only so much.

The easiest way to think about this is you both get equal leisure time.

I think the person working fewest hours should do more chores/childcare. That's always been the set up with me and DH anyway.

If i was FT and he was PT, I'd be totally unimpressed if I had to come home and cook/clean.

The person working fewer hours should do a lot of the housework.

You should both have equal downtime. Childcare counts as work, at least until the children are all at least junior school age.

Not sure I would want to be in a relationship this microscopically transactional.

If A is working an extra 3 or 4 hours a week, I don't think B needs to ensure they are putting in a full 3 or 4 hours of extra housework a week but should do a little more, but if A is pulling 5-10+ hours extra at work each week then yes, B should be taking on a fair chunk more of the housework.

I think people have different ideas about housework and there is a lot of invisible HW. Are you talking about stuff like dusting and cleaning bathrooms? That should potentially be shared equally.

You need to count washing, washing up, tidying, preparing kid's food, cleaning up messes, sweeping, vacuuming, kid's homework, kid's activities and reading...

I think the money and financial contribution to the household is irrelevant and what matters more is hours worked. The person who works less hours should do more at home.

Thank you everyone!

You’ve really helped me to reassess my opinion on this.

Childcare is housework. If the person who is part time is actively looking after young children, therfore reducing childcare costs and allowing the other full time person to actively pursue their career, other chores should be split 50/50.

I think it’s more about having the same amount of free time; when you have kids it’s not so easy to split chores as kids take a lot of work

I disagree that looking after your own children is work or housework It's not a chore, it's a privilege that not everyone can take advantage of. I find it weird that people seem to resentful.

Yes I’d expect the person working less hours to do more of the household tasks. ( which in our household is me) .

You need to give more details.

How many hours more work does person A do?

How many extra hours of extra childcare does person B do?

While I do agree in part, I also think that looking after children limits you in pursuing other hobbies.

So say you and DH are both avid runners and then have kids, if your DH is then able to pursue running after work and you can't fit a run in during the day cos of childcare, it's not totally fair. So your DH would ideally step up so that you can run in the evenings too.