Inequality in housework: "Mothers are increasingly going out to work, fathers are doing the childcare - it looks like equality, but what about the chores?"

[morningpaper]

Article in this morning's Family Section

I was reading this article this morning about how, even in dual-income households, women are still expected to do most of the chores.

It was interesting and I'm quite sure is true, although the question that I didn't feel it addressed was 'why?' and how we can change this for our children.

I can HONESTLY say that I have never asked DP to 'put a load of washing on' or 'hoover up' - but we are both really anal about housework. I was actually reading in the conservatory this while he was packing the children's bags and supervising the children because he has taken them out for the day so I can get on with some work.

I don't know why his expectations are of housework-equality, except that he did act as 'carer' to his mother as a child a great deal, so the idea of a woman running around after him is not one he has learnt.

I must admit that my first husband was utterly useless and when I left him I left full instructions on how to use the washing machine and a pile of his favourite recipes . I don't know whether I would put up with this now - obviously I like this think not, but if I was married to an incompetent then maybe I would just get on with the bulk of the housework for an easy life.

So, what sets men's expectations that a woman will do the cleaning and housework? And how do we change it for our sons/daughters?

My DH will happily do housework, but by the time he gets around to doing it I have already done it ages ago....

I think the only long term way to stop it is for women to absolutely bloody-mindedly refuse to let it happen. My DP does half the housework and childcare but that is mainly down to me not accepting anything less - he's naturally very messy and doesn't "see" housework, and he was brought up not lifting a finger around the house.

but he knows I would leave him if he doesn't pull his weight on this issue so he does it. And he does think he should do it, theoretically.

WWW my mother thinks he's an absolute saint to do housework (and put up with me) - she's always telling him to sit down and have a rest while she feeds him up It's distinctly irritating.

www, that's fair then. Some women are happy with unfairness too which we mustn't discount. For cultural reasons they (idiots that they are) think it's fine that women do everything at home even if they work longer hours than their man. In fact part time work is part of the problem. If women either worked full time or not at all then you've have both working full time earning about the same and both doing chores at home or wife at home not working so fair enough she does the chores. It's the part time work that makes things harder then to operate fairly.

Never marry sexist men. A lot of these women have only themselves to blame or perhaps that's all they could get the very sexist men who want to be waited on hand and foot and that that is better than no husband at all.

Oh feck. I go back to work tomorrow leaving DP at home with DS. DP is currently blind to mess. I will have to work on this. Thank you Twinklemegan and Sycamoretree for the WOHM side of things

My MIL thinks I've trained DH into being some sort of domestic god. No idea why, as he was like this when we met! We share pretty much equally - I guess I try to do a bit more, as I work PT, so will do a bit more on the days I'm not in work, but we just seem to manage it without any dispute or resentment. Have no idea how! I think one thing is to get together with someone who has roughly the same level of tolerance for mess as you do.

re the 'why do they put up with it' question - morningpaper maybe you remember that facebook discussion about feminism and flylady? the consensus seemed to be that women were doing housework for themselves - because being untidy and disorganised stressed them out

there was a story by a woman who was supposed to share the chores, eg washing up with her dp; but whereas she would do hers straight after a meal, his would sit there for days. So she would leave hers for days, and the only person who was bothered by it was her because her kitchen was rank

I'll nick a quote from her actually since she said it very well: "Now, I'm living how I want to - in a neat, clean, happy apartment, with all my laundry done, with a kitchen that doesn't smell of mildewing dishes, with a bed that just screams "Jump in!" at night. That in itself feels more feminist to me than my previous situation, because I'm living life the way it feels good to me, instead of getting so caught up in the gender wars that my "house" didn't feel like my home."

the link to the discussion is here

if your dh/dp does little work, and you end up taking it on because it bothers you and only you, is this something that you have brought on yourself in a negative way, or a positive way that you have decided to take control?

I do take your point Capp but I have heard that argument trotted out time and again and I think it's another way of getting out of contributing. I don't think if you have children it's acceptable to live like students with foul mildewing dishes. Or never make their packed lunch. Or make arrangements to ferry them about to pursue their lives.

If you don't have children then it's much, much harder to make your case but frankly I wouldn't set up home with a bloke who was prepared to live like a pig. Conversely, there are some people who like their houses to look like a show home and that is the other extreme.

But a compromise should be sought without one person having to bend to the will of the other when it comes to household chores. I think it sets a hugely dangerous precedent for other areas of the relationship if you just capitulate and do all the cleaning yourself.

The point about picking someone with similar standards is obviously wise.

I am not sure most men are content with more mess than most women as that has not been my experience but if that is so then that's going to be an issue whoever works full time or doesn't. of course many women and men earn enough to pay someone else to clean up which solves some of the problem. And some women are happy to live in mess and have husbands who get home from work all day, woman been just playing with children and then the man who hates mess tidies up.

Oh no xenia, I don't necessarily think it's a gender thing at all. I've met absolute pigs of both sexes

I did go out with a man once who is highly respected in his field, regularly appears on television as the 'voice' of his industry and he lived in such grime that he didn't want me to see his house. When I finally did, I couldn't believe that anyone could actually live like that (and he'd cleaned up apparently). His carpets were so filthy I didn't want to walk barefoot. There's messy and then there's just plain dirty - it was a lot worse than most of the squats I've been to.

Sorry - bit off topic but I suddenly remembered

I'm an SAHM at the mo', but I fully expect DH to do his share. Me home allows him to focus fully, with flexibility, on his career, but he's got to be through the door by 6pm and do his share until 8:30pm. Family first. During the night - he does DS1 and I do DS2 if the wake. I expect him to take time off work if they are sick (thankfully rarely).

This is just my opionion, but I don't see why couples have to battle it out in the workplace for equality. So many of my friends are doing the 3-day week thing (with FT partners and pre-schoolers). They admit financially it's not worth it, they're (both) exhausted, stressed........ but seem to think their partners will disrespect them if they stay at home. I don't look to the workplace for equality or intellectual stimulation - it's a job, it pays the mortgage etc. No more.

Highlander's point made me think - what do we mean by 'chores'?

is bathtime a chore? cooking? what about reading bedtime stories? supervising children's reading?

if by 'chores' we mean only laundry, ironing, cleaning etc, then we are narrowing it down too far. I often end up doing these as 'displacement activities' when dh comes home, because if it has been a SAH day (I work p/t usually) I am ready for a change and putting away laundry seems far preferable to watching the children do something else

I certainly don't feel I am being oppressed - indeed I run away cackling

no Xenia I don't want to work full time thanks for offering

Yes, good point. I don't see bath as a chore IF it involves me in the bath with vanilla bubbles and dd in with me playing.
I do see it as a chore if I have to sit and watch/wash her on the sidelines

I want to cook at the weekend when I have time to but I can't bear it after 12 hours out of the house

I can't stand laundry, hate it and never get any pleasure from it so it's pure chore

Reading books to children is enjoyable but not always at the end of a 12 hr day...

What are chores? For most people that would be house cleaning for a start. In the years before we could afford a cleaner we shared it. My ex husband dealt with all cloth nappies in the 1980s every night and at one time all 3 children were in nappies at night, baby, 1 year old and 3 year old so that's a lot of nappies. I think it's hard to share jobs - so you give one person one job and they always do that and you forget about it and you take another. Then you aren't into the helping situation at all. It's simply the job that that person wrings out the nappies and puts them away when dry or that person does all the washing.

It certainly helped when we got someone in the mornings to do all the washing, cleaning and sorting out bed rooms, beds etc except at weekends. But that's only possible because of what I earn.

We shared the bed time routine and so did my parents. Usually my mother read my sister's and my story and my father did my little brother's in the 1960s. My father did all night feeds (breast feeding stopped when I was a month old) even though he worked full time. With my ex husband I got up to the children in the first year (as I was feeding) and he did after that and in our case they did wake a lot in years 2 and 3 so that was a fair swap and also my work was more important as it earned a lot more money in terms of the family's future so if either was to be tired it ought to be him not me. So does it all come down to money and power in a relationship and who earns most? If you earn nothing you can't negotiate as you don't have any power and are grateful for every penny he gives you?

ooh Xenia I am unsure about your logic there

dh and I shared the night feeds with dd1 (she was formula fed) and since dd2 weaned he has fully shared night wakings with me

dd1 wakes more during the night because of her disability and especially when she was younger she was a dreadful sleeper, and dh did probably 60% of night waking

but he didn't do this because I earned more; a lot of that time I was not working at all, or working part time with very flexible hours

he did it because they are his children too

Though I am sure that money is part of the equation in some marriages, it isn't what my relationship runs on. Certainly dh's full time job and the fact that he is the main breadwinner would cut no ice with me if he brought it up when dd2 needed the toilet at 4am, and I know he doesn't think it is relevant either

however I do agree that fully sharing all tasks is unworkable; there has to be an element of division of labour otherwise some jobs get done twice and others not at all

With regards to money and power I'd like to make another point - a friend of mine who earns a good deal more than me obviously believes that by employing a cleaner she has had some kind of feminist victory because her dh does nothing round the house at all. She has the financial power to employ someone to do it for her. She pays the cleaner, she sorts out the cleaning supplies, makes a list of jobs, and liaises with the agency whenever a cleaner moves on, and he still has no involvement. It is still nothing to do with him because he is a Man (they earn roughly the same btw). Now I know that this is not true of all marriages, but with hers I found her dh's lack of respect for what needed doing round the home, and his belief that it was not his job, is still there, even with the band-aid of a cleaner. I don't have that lack of respect in my marriage, and wouldn't know how to live with it, yet she obviously thinks I am somehow more oppressed as a woman because I clean my own toilet. Throwing money at a problem doesn't take away the reason for that problem, which might be the unpalatable thing in itself.

indeed Cappuccino, and I wonder if your friend's cleaner is perchance a woman? It's not really a feminist victory if women are still doing all the cleaning, even if they're being paid (low wages) for it.

I agree wtih C over the lack of respect problem. It's when men are as likely as women to check out nurseries and childminders that we actually will have made some progress (and if over 20 years ago my children's father and I could operate like that or find a nanny together I don't see why it's not possible nowadays). Perhaps some men are just very sexist. Or do we need women to earn a multiple of their husband's pay, say double or more before men may be the person in the marriage to find and arrange the cleaner if there is going to be a cleaner.

I'd hope not, Xenia. We earn pretty much the same (both on same HE scale), and DH is equally interested in DD's nursery. Just as well, as he does the dropping off, picking up etc. But he is most certainly not sexist, so maybe your wealth imbalance model is designed to mitigate against sexism?

Does it matter who does what in any household as long as both partners are happy with the arrangement? It's when one isn't happy that the resentment sets in. For me, it's not about gender, it's the basic inequality that would p* me off. I suppose I probably do more at the moment because I 'only' work part-time, so that blurs the division of labour a bit, but DH does all the food shopping (if it were me we'd have it delivered pdq) and virtually all the cooking. If the kids are hungry, they don't bother asking me what's for tea, they go straight to him. I do most of the housework and laundry, because he's made himself crap at it, although I've just passed a load of ironing his way as he's dominating the sitting room watching sport at the moment, so while he's there, next to the ironing board...... There's a nice smell of roast pork wafting up the stairs at the moment, too, and I've just been brought a glass of chilled wine!! He thinks I'm working, however, so had to minimise this pretty sharply!

Mr Inferior is currently ironing his shirts . He does the washing, too. (I put it away. I feel unspeakable rage when I do this, but frankly I need to get over myself, don't I.)

We do pay a cleaner but I completely take the point that this is not a Feminist Solution to Male Idleness. (In the Inferiority Complex it's a solution to the fact I whinge and angst about the cleaning while DP gets out the hoover .)

Where this facade of gorgeous gender equality breaks down spectacularly is in Remembering Stuff To Do With The Children (a broad category which includes, just to take an example, homework and DD1's forthcoming birthday party ) but that is a different albeit related issue.

When DH and I both worked full time, we paid a cleaner to do the housework, and a nanny looked after the children (apart from Fridays, when my mother cared for them). All other stuff we split as felt natural. He always did the dishwasher, I always emptied the bins etc.

I am currently on maternity leave, and DH was made redundant about two months into my leave, so we have been at home together throughout. We have shared the practical care of the children, and he's been fantastic on the whole (needs to be, he's going to be SAHD when I go back to work in a month). We've also managed to hold onto our cleaner by the skin of our financial teeth.

However, I completely echo the complaint about them thinking ahead when it comes to care of the children. He just doesn't. He'll wait to be told, then happily do it. I came home from visiting my parents with DD1 today. He stayed home with 6 month DS as he is unwell. It's too boring to go into the details, but suffice to say the routine that we have got DS into for the last 2 weeks seemed to have completely flown out of the window. When I asked him what had happened, he just said "I did ask you to write it down....". And I consider myself to have a pretty hands on husband when it comes to all domestic matters...

I am very interested to see whether this dynamic shifts once he takes over the childcare full time, and whether he decides to make it his territory, and start issuing me with instructions, or whether he'll still expect me to be dictating how things run. I have a secret test to see whether at any point he suggests moving DS onto a follow on milk, which we both know from previous experience should be happening any day now....

Whilst I couldn't agree more that a fair division of the household chores and childcare is an absolute must in any relationship (I could absolutely NOT live with a man who didn't contribute equally).

I do think that this "new way" (that's my mother's term) is creating a very unique brand of relationship angst - I call it the UPC (the ultimate pissing contest). If DH and I are not careful our whole lives become one great big contest. Which variably goes something like this:

ME: I changed 5 shitty nappies today.
DH: I changed 5 shitty nappies, cleaned two loos and negotiated a deal at work.
ME: Well I changed 5 shitty nappies, mopped up two lots of sick, cleaned 2 loos, closed two deals blah, blah, blah...

Seriously - it seems to be becoming a real problem in households with equal division. I have a fair few friends who say it's exactly the same.

The one thing that can be said for the old way - is that the little woman knew her place and there were never any arguments or expectations on how many shitty nappies were enough in one day...