Work for the Household: Its Nature and Consequences for Husbands and Wives

Abstract

This paper examines the conditions under which work for the household is performed, comparing these conditions and their effects with those of paid employment. Although there are some significant differences, the working conditions of housework do not differ greatly from those of paid employment. There are, however, as expected, marked sex differences in spheres of responsibility and activity. Wives are responsible for and actually do a vastly wider range of household tasks than husbands. In terms of its effects, housework has decided psychological consequences for women whether or not they are employed outside the home. Men are less affected by housework than women and in different ways. Employed women react similarly to similar housework and paidwork conditions; this is not the case for men. The pattern of findings is congruent with the hypothesis that responses to household labor, as to paid employment, are conditional on the imperativeness of work conditions. The fact that wives have greater housework responsibilities than husbands makes work in the home particularly salient for women's psychological functioning.