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Men are doing at least as much household work as women,
according to a new survey conducted by the University of
Michigan Institute for Social Research (ISR), the world's
largest academic survey and research organization.
The recently released study shows that women do an average of 27
hours of housework a week, compared to 16 hours a week for men.
Balanced against this, however, is the study's less-publicized
finding that the average man spends 14 hours a week more on the
job than the average woman. Thus men's overall contribution to
the household is actually slightly higher than women's.
In fact, studies conducted by the ISR and others have found that
rough equality between the workloads shouldered by men and women
has existed for at least four decades. Gender issues author
Warren Farrell says that these findings belie the misconception
that our era is that of "the second shift woman and the
shiftless man."
As Farrell notes, negative references to men and housework
litter our popular culture. "The Myth of Male Housework: For
Women, Toil Looms From Sun to Sun" wrote one major publication,
over a cartoon depicting a woman juggling (and struggling) with
a baby, a roasted turkey, and a house pet, while her husband
watches TV and "juggles" his beer and his potato chips. Other
major publications have highlighted women's burdens under
headlines such as "For Women, Having It All May Mean Doing It
All," and "The Trouble with Men," with one even commenting, "A
woman's work is never done, a man is drunk from sun to sun."
According to Farrell, the idea of the "second shift woman and
the shiftless man" was brought into vogue in part by UC Berkeley
professor Arlie Hochschild's best-selling 1989 book The
Second Shift. In it she wrote (and much of the media
uncritically repeated) that "women work an extra month of 24
hour days each year." But Hochschild's research and conclusions
were deeply flawed. For the most part she compared the
housework burdens of full-time employed males with those of
part-time employed females, portraying men working 50 hour weeks
as lazy and selfish for not doing as much housework as their
wives who were working a 20 hour week.
Hochschild also claimed that men did no more housework in the
late 1980s than in the pre-feminist era, but, with one minor
exception, she used data on male housework from studies done in
the pre-feminist era, rendering it worthless. In addition, the
book also defined "housework" to include chores usually done by
women, ignoring most of the household tasks generally done by
men.
The "second shift" myth also stems from the idea that today both
husband and wife work what is presumed to be a 40 hour week, but
when both go home at five, the woman does housework and the man
does little. Gloria Steinem, in fact, says that in today's
economy men have one job, but women have two. In reality, while
some couples' economic lives conform to the 40-40 model, the
average full-time employed man works eight hours a week more
than the full-time employed woman, women are four times as
likely as men to work part-time, and women are much more likely
than men to be full-time homemakers. Housework burdens naturally
reflect this.
Feminists correctly note that, as a general rule, both men and
women list housework as one of their least enjoyable tasks and,
since women do more housework than men, this shifts the
advantage to men. However, while people may not enjoy cooking
or folding the laundry in and of themselves, they are usually
much happier at home and in casual dress (and perhaps talking on
the phone or watching TV while they work), than they are in a
supervised and regimented work environment. Also, while
housework may seem like drudgery compared to middle-class white
collar jobs, it doesn't when compared to blue collar or "pink
collar" work.
In addition, both the ISR survey and The Second Shift
count only hours worked, without noting the special
contributions of men who do dangerous and physically demanding
work. Of the 25 most dangerous jobs listed by the US Department
of Labor, men comprise at least 90% of the labor force in all of
them. According to the Occupational Safety and Health
Administration, nearly 50 American workers are injured every
minute of the 40-hour work week, and every day 17 die--16 of
them male.
Despite the withering criticism men have endured, it is clear
that men are doing their fair share in the home, and have been
since before the feminist era.
This column
first appeared in the Pasadena
Star-News & Affiliated Papers
(4/7/02).
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