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The Chore Wars
Posted by Felicity Buchanan on Mon, 08/13/2007 - 5:42pm
How often have you thought that you’re doing more than your fair share? If you’re a woman with children and a job, plus a golf-playing, TV-watching spouse, probably a lot. It can make you feel so resentful that there are many days when you’d really rather not be married anymore.
Well, you aren’t alone. “Chore wars” are now one of the major factors in divorce, according to sociologist Lynne Prince Cooke at the University of Kent in Cambridge, England.
In a paper she presented to the Council of Contemporary Families, she stated: “I found that couples where the wife earns about 40 percent of the income while the husband does about 40 percent of the housework have the lowest risk of divorce,” she wrote. In contrast, the risk of divorce rises if the husband is the sole earner and the wife is the sole cleaner, or if the opposite is true — the wife brings in more than 80 percent of income and the husband is “Mr. Mom.”
While many husbands agree in theory to the concept of equitably sharing chores and child care, it’s been my experience that they’re long on rhetoric and short on action.
Were “chore wars” a factor in your marriage or divorce? See also Katherine McKee’s take on this topic.
Click here for more.
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What Others Have Shared ()
We must remember that
We must remember that marriage is a partnership and that we need to communicate when we want something done. Spouses aren't mind readers. Now, there are those who do all the work and have lazy significant others. Chances are, they were lazy before the wedding and continue to be lazy after. I don't know what the solution is...
CM
Marriage is a partnership.
But what do you do when you "partner" decides his ONLY responsibility to
you, your family is to bring home a paycheck. And for the last 12-years even
that isn't all that stable... it's always there but he still says "Don't spend anything, we're going to have to declare bankruptcy next week."
He won't take out garbage. He won't walk the dogs. He won't help son with
homework. He won't make the bed. He won't take his clothes to the dry cleaner (that he passes on his way to work.) He won't put his beer cans
in the recycle bin. He just WONT. He thinks it's enough that he brings home
a paycheck. He works 15hr days in order for us to be broke.
Now, to be fair, I haven 't worked but a few part time jobs since we've had
our son BECAUSE my having a job and "needing" things from him - well, it's
too inconvenient for him.
God I hate this man. I need a divorce. But I have NO resources to speak of.
Help.
Kma