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CNN
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Few women will be surprised to learn that even when wives earn about as much as their husbands or more, a new Pew Research Center study finds that they still spend more time on housework and childcare, while their husbands spend more time on paid work and leisure.
“Even as financial contributions have become more equal in marriages, the way couples divide their time between paid work and family life remains unbalanced,” Pew noted.
So who wins what?
Pew found that in 29 percent of today’s heterosexual marriages, women and men earn about the same income (about $60,000 each). “Husbands in egalitarian marriages spend about 3.5 hours more per week on leisure activities than wives. Wives in these marriages spend about 2 hours more per week on caregiving than husbands and about 2.5 hours more on housework,” the study notes.
In 55% of heterosexual marriages, men are the primary or sole breadwinners, earning an average of $96,000 compared to $30,000 for their wives.
Meanwhile, in 16% of marriages, wives earn more than their husbands as the primary (10%) or sole breadwinner (6%). In these marriages, the wives earn an average of $88,000 compared to their husbands’ $35,000.
Of all these categories, the only one in which men spend more time caring for their wives than their wives is where the wife is the sole breadwinner. And the time spent per week on household chores in these marriages is divided equally between husbands and wives.
Either way, this is a big change from 50 years ago – when, for example, husbands were the primary breadwinners in 85% of marriages.
Today, which women are most likely to be the primary or sole breadwinner can vary by age, marital status, education and race.
For example, Pew found that black women are “significantly more likely” than other women to earn more than their husbands. For example, 26% of black women earn more at home than their husbands, compared to just 17% of white women and 13% of Hispanic women.
But black women with a college degree or higher and few children at home are also among the most likely to earn about the same as their husbands.
These figures are presented in the context of societal attitudes about who should earn more and how care should be divided between spouses.
Nearly half of Americans (48%) in the Pew survey said husbands prefer to earn more than their wives, while 13% said men would prefer their wives earn about the same as their wives. them.
What do women want? Twenty-two percent of Americans said most women want a husband who earns more, while 26 percent said most would want a man who earns about the same.
Additionally, when it comes to starting a family, 77% say children do better when both parents focus equally on work and childcare. Only 19% said children do better when their mother focuses more on family life and their father focuses more on his work.
The Pew study draws on three data sources: income data from the U.S. Census Current Population Survey; data from the American Time Use Survey and a nationally representative survey of public attitudes of 5,152 U.S. adults conducted in January.
Cnn
