Young and Beautiful. Domestic Work Among Childless Women and Men

Abstract

This chapter examines the time use patterns of childless women and men living independently or in couples. Women and men at this stage are not expected to be strongly affected by dynamics of time availability, power and resources compared to older individuals and parents. In contrast, our results indicate that gender differences are present among both singles and partnered individuals. Gender differences peak among couples and especially for typically female activities such as cooking, cleaning the house and doing the laundry. The chapter also analyses whether individual characteristics—such as level of education, employment status and area of residence—affect time on and participation in housework. The results largely confirm previous findings: highly educated women do fewer chores than low educated ones and non-employed women do more. Moreover, women in the Southern regions and in the Islands tend to do more housework compared to the Northern area and men less, again confirm previous results on the large cultural differences within the country, with the South being more traditional. Thus, even among younger and, in principle, more modern Italians, women are doing significantly more housework than men.