Money & society · 2025
Do US adults think earning more or working longer justifies doing less housework?
To some extent, yes. In a survey experiment involving 1,502 US adults, respondents treated higher earnings or longer work hours relative to a spouse as reasons that could justify doing less housework, for both men and women. These were fairness judgments about hypothetical different-sex couples, not observations of actual household behavior.
Details
Researchers asked a nationally representative sample of US adults to rate how fairly hypothetical couples divided housework. They varied several features of the scenarios to examine how respondents weighed each spouse’s contributions.
Respondents viewed relative earnings and work time as contributions that could partly justify doing fewer chores. This applied to both men and women. They also rated arrangements in which women did a larger share of housework as less fair than arrangements in which men did a larger share.
The authors interpret the findings as suggesting a shift in expectations about women’s and men’s household roles. Yet this contrasts with actual housework patterns: although the gap has narrowed, women still spend more time on household tasks than men in most high-income contexts. The experiment does not establish that opinions have changed over time or that these judgments translate into how couples divide chores at home.
What do you think?
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