How Less Might Be More At the World Cup
June 15, 2014
Six Facts About Australia From The "World Cup of Everything Else"
June 17, 2014
Our Monday gender issue focus
Married or single, weekends and weekdays, men have more leisure time than women.
Imagine a typical weekend. Yes, mom might spend a bit less time watching the kids and dad does do more housework. However, when it comes to leisure, during Saturday and Sunday, the dads relax an hour more than the moms. Specifically, dad watches the kids close to 75% as much as mom and does 71% as much housework as his wife. So you can see why she has less leisure time.
During the workweek, mom also has less leisure time than dad. Because dads spend close to one half the time as moms on children and on housework, they have more leisure time and use it mostly to watch TV.
Here is how leisure time is allocated:
From: Pew Research
You can see below how parents compare.
From: Pew Research
And here is how all of us compare:
From: Pew Research
In addition, there is a difference between moms who work outside the home and those who do not:
From: Pew Research
And finally, here is the historical perspective. (We should note that college educated, more affluent individuals have less leisure time than lower wage earners with no more than a high school diploma.)
From: “Measuring Trends in Leisure: The Allocation of Time Over Five Decades” by M Aguiar and E. Hurst
Our bottom line: Although we are not working, leisure is very much a part of our market system through our allocation of time, of money and its gender and income implications.
Does the research confirm your own leisure experience? Please let us know in a comment.
