Postulations on Workload Distribution

In order to sustain a nice home, one must do the following things

• Maintain the organization and cleanliness of possesions
  • Laundry
  • Dishes
  • Straightening home
  • Disposing of waste
  • Vehicle maintenance
  • Cleaning dirt accumulated automatically (dust, etc)
• Prepare food to eat
• Run errands to obtain items necessary for comfortable living
• Care for members of the household unable to care for themselves (children, the elderly, and/or pets if present)
• Maintain the grounds or any plants

In a household with one adult, that one adult handles the entire workload for herself. The level of work goes up with each additional member of the household, especially if the members are dependants OR able bodied adults unwilling to share in the workload. When a household consists of two able bodied adults, those two adults can, and should, negotiate an equitable workload balance.

In my mother's family, the women handled everything inside the house and the men handled everything outside. As you can see from the list generated above, this is two bullets out of ten. In practice, the women often had to pick up the slack when the men did not do their work. The men did not offer the women the same courtesy.

There is no formula for what tasks should go to whom, so instead, I offer this suggestion. Measure the workload by the amount of downtime each person gets. Downtime is the time used to pursue one's own interests outside of work for income and work to sustain a nice home. If one adult in the house has a hobby on which s/he works for one hour per day, then the other member of the household should have the same. Please note that shopping for necessities - including clothing - is not a hobby. Both partners should feel the same sense of fulfillment and acomplishment she would feel if each were independent. Both partners should also fully appreciate the other's contribution to the household and neither should fancy herself "better" than the other.