Let’s just stipulate, right off the bat, that mom is far more likely to be the person arranging dentist appointments, buying toilet paper, and picking out a birthday present for little Kevin down the block, whose mom is going to take it back if it’s not organic anyway, so why bother thinking about it?
Let’s assume this is 100 percent true: It still doesn’t mean that women are being “dragged down” and that men have an easy life, as the write-up of an old study about household duties suggests. Lisa Wade, at Time, writes:
And, to be fair, while women who are married to or cohabiting with men do more domestic work than their partners, husbands spend proportionally more time on paid work. Today the amount of sheer hours that men and women spend in combined paid and unpaid work is pretty close to equal.
But that doesn’t count the thinking.
Husbands may do more housework and childcare than before, but women still delegate:
Wade defines thinking as work, which I one hundred percent agree with. In fact, this knowledge aspect is one reason why I found the Department of Labor’s attempt to classify all employees earning less than $47,476 as hourly workers to be problematic. A knowledge job means you don’t stop working just because you’re away from your desk, but I digress.
To keep reading, click here: No, Ladies, You’re Not Thinking More Than Men
Sexual stereotyping can not be reinforced too often.
Suzanne, thank you for writing this excellent article. So much of today’s dialogue re: women has an us vs. them feel to it. Women and men are meant to be together, work together and learn from each other whether as employees, employers, friends, partners, spouses etc. and trivializing or cheerleading the efforts of either gender at the expense of another is not healthy.
Agreed! We work as a team. That means he mostly does the dishes, changes the oil and handles all sorts of stuff I don’t. I do the finances, make appointments, fill out forms, and other stuff. It’s called TEAMWORK and having each one do the things they are better at. It’s not a man vs. woman thing (at least in my marriage).
So who’s your audience here? Knowledge workers or blue collar? I’m pretty sure that national suicide rates are generally related to increases among middle aged blue collar men that feel they are no longer providing. As for knowledge workers, well I’m so bad at math I couldn’t possibly count up the number of hours I work and that my husband works and figure out the difference now could I? And although I work more hours and he does contribute to the household I do need to keep reminding him he can pay bills too, or schedule the appointments that he will drive children to.
We work as a team, but for most things we don’t divide it as Jessica’s responsibilities/Roger’s responsibilities. If I see the dishes need to be done I do them, if Jessica sees the trash needs to be taken out she does it. Groceries: whoever decides to go just messages the other and asks if they need anything. Clothes shopping: we each do our own. Taking care of baby mostly-grown-up Baby Rabbit: we share and do whatever needs to be done. For her major volunteer activity, I’m the supportive spouse who does a lot of behind the scenes heavy lifting. Jessica would say she does a little more domestic activities and that’s true, but I’m also working a full time job and teaching multiple classes as a professor. Both my jobs are thinking jobs so I’m constantly thinking and this leads into my employment agreement which states that anytime I think about my day-job or anything related, they own my thoughts, Hah!
As Dawn said, it’s called teamwork. For our team it just works a little differently.
Great article 🙂
This goes into a lot of deep issues. Like above commenters said, teamwork is crucial in a partnership, and that’s really important. I know men suffer and I know they go through a lot of crap they don’t want to talk about. It’s like pulling teeth to get my husband to respond when I want to talk about emotion. That’s why I encourage my son to name his feelings, so he doesn’t hold them back. At the same time, men need to understand that domestic things ARE work. The act of juggling everything is huge for me. I am a manager, teach part-time online, and have to manage the care of my family and the bills. My husband just does what I tell him to. He does not have a management job, so he doesn’t even maintain a to-do list or calendar. My calendar keeps the wheels of the family running. If I stopped doing that, everything would fall apart. And that is work.