Working wives spend 7.4-fold more time on housework than husbands

A study shows married women in dual-income households still spend more time on housework than their husbands. / Gettyimagesbank

By Bahk Eun-ji

Despite changes in traditional gender roles, working women in dual-income households still do much more housework than their husbands, a study shows Wednesday.

According to the study by the Korea Institute for Health and Social Affairs (KIHASA), based on 2014 data from Statistics Korea, married men in dual-income families spent 546.8 minutes at their workplace, or 1.3 times more than women, who spend 412.4 minutes.

But after work on weekdays, the wives spent 129.5 minutes on household chores a day, or 7.4 times more than the husbands who spent 17.4 minutes. For childcare, women spent 52.2 minutes, 3.5 times more than men's 14.9 minutes during weekdays.

Wives still spent more time on both household chores and childcare on weekends. Men spent 41 minutes on housework and 28.8 minutes on childcare per day, compared to women's 176.4 minutes and 48.6 minutes, respectively.

Meanwhile, in single-income households where only men are breadwinners, men spent 553.7 minutes working, and only 11.5 minutes on housework on weekdays. Their wives spent 238.9 minutes on household chores.

“Long work hours at the workplace leads to less time for housework and childcare, so reducing work hours is the most important,” said Cho Sung-ho, a KIHASA researcher who led the study. “Considering the very small time the husbands spend on housework and childcare compared to their wives, reducing men's long work hours will be the priority for couples to achieve a work-life balance.”