Evaluate this married couple's division of labor

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Both spouses should have equal leisure time. That’s it.

100%.

[Anonymous]

Have you read Fair Play/used the cards? You might find it useful.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:are they kids eating two school lunches? You have it under both. but how is this even a question spouse B is doing much more work. spouse A needs to do more around the house and with the kids.

I think packing and preparing are two different tasks. Preparing is more labor intensive

I am having trouble thinking f these as two separate tasks in most households. Can you give an example of how it works?

We don’t do this, but it could be something like: makes 2 sandwiches, boils a pot of pasta, bags the chips and slices an apples into 2 bags and leaves it all in the fridge. Then parent #2 actually takes the baggies and sandwiches (or apportions the pasta?) and puts it into lunchboxes.

If that’s it, then what parent #2 does can easily be done by the kids.

I can't imagine one parent bagging apples, and then the other parent putting the bags in the lunchbox. I mean you can't do that early.

If they're that inefficient, they're both to blame.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Also I would MUCH rather plan vacations (we don’t take them), over having to figure out Christmas presents for literally everyone in DH’s family and having some people clearly not be as happy with their presents because…..well, I don’t know them very well, and we don’t spend time together. WTF. You get to GO on vacation!!!!!!!

Planning and taking vacations with kids is 70% hard work and 30% fun.

[Anonymous]

This is similar to the dynamics in my.house. I am spouse A. I spend 2 hours a day on a bus commuting, so that eats into the amount of time I can otherwise contribute to the household.

[Anonymous]

This may have been answered, but how many hours does each person work per week. If Spouse A is in the office 5x/week but is only expected to work 40 hours, and Spouse B has more flexibility but regularly works 60 hours, then these cancel each other out.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:It seems kind of unfair to put down spouse A for making pre-prepared dinners when they WOH AND are responsible for getting kids to all their activities on weekdays.

Agree. This makes no sense at all. The WAH should do dinners, can just be crock pot or something simple. If I hustle to leave the office at 5, pick up kids from school and then get home. THEN I have to make dinner and then drive the kids to practice? This makes no sense. What is the WAH spouse doing at this time?

[Anonymous]

Better than most! Both spouses do a lot.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Division of labor has recently become an issue in our marriage. Before losing my mind, I want unbiased opinions on whether either spouse has a legitimate gripe. I've tried to be fair in putting together a list of each spouse's responsibilities to see if either of us are overreacting. Neither of us seems to feel like our contributions are appreciated.

Are we both stuck in our own silo. Is this a fair division of labor or does either Spouse A or B have the right to complain? Are there any areas I may be missing? Any recommendations to minimize the headbutting. For context we have two elementary aged kids (3rd and 5th grade).

SPOUSE A
* Works in office 5 days a week; contributes one-fourth of household income
* Responsible for managing family calendar to include scheduling kids activities, camps, etc.
* Does the holiday gift shopping
* Prepares the weekly grocery list for grocery store pickup
* Washing and folding of kids laundry
* Schedules house cleaners (they aren't on regular schedule)
* Shops for kids clothes
* Prepares school lunches
* Picks up kids from school
* Shuttles kids to evening activities with occasional help from spouse
* Responsible for daily dinners every other week (mostly cooks packaged meals like frozen dinners)
* Coaches/leads two kids sports/activities

SPOUSE B
* Works in office 2-3 days per week with great flexibility; contributes 3/4 of HHI
* Responsible for family finances including budgeting, retirement planning, bill pay
* Plans family vacations/trips
* Responsible for house and yard maintenance and upkeep including planning and coordination of contractors for large projects and hands-on work for routine maintenance and repairs
* Picks up and puts up groceries
* Cleans house in between cleaners visits to include vacuuming/mopping, bathrooms, dusting
* Packs school lunches and feeds kids breakfast
* Drops off kids at school and is the primary at-home parent (watches kids on no-school days, picks up kids when sick or early dismissals)
* Primary shuttle for kids weekend activities with occasional help from spouse
* Responsible for daily dinners every other week (mostly cooks from scratch meals)
* Coaches/leads two kids sports/activities

Just putting it out there that income should not matter if you are both working FT. Its division of labor.

Wild take. The low income spouse should quit their hobby job and bring down the work load on everyone.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Explain to me how the split of income is relevant here, Spouse OP. I mean B.

+1

This split actually looks reasonably equal to me, which is good. I suspect Spouse B wants "credit" for being the higher earner and Spouse A wants "credit" for having the less flexible, in-office job. But in reality neither of these things matter and how much they each make matters even less.

If they both feel underappreciated, they should focus on appreciating each other more. Neither one is slacking off.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Division of labor has recently become an issue in our marriage. Before losing my mind, I want unbiased opinions on whether either spouse has a legitimate gripe. I've tried to be fair in putting together a list of each spouse's responsibilities to see if either of us are overreacting. Neither of us seems to feel like our contributions are appreciated.

Are we both stuck in our own silo. Is this a fair division of labor or does either Spouse A or B have the right to complain? Are there any areas I may be missing? Any recommendations to minimize the headbutting. For context we have two elementary aged kids (3rd and 5th grade).

SPOUSE A
* Works in office 5 days a week; contributes one-fourth of household income
* Responsible for managing family calendar to include scheduling kids activities, camps, etc.
* Does the holiday gift shopping
* Prepares the weekly grocery list for grocery store pickup
* Washing and folding of kids laundry
* Schedules house cleaners (they aren't on regular schedule)
* Shops for kids clothes
* Prepares school lunches
* Picks up kids from school
* Shuttles kids to evening activities with occasional help from spouse
* Responsible for daily dinners every other week (mostly cooks packaged meals like frozen dinners)
* Coaches/leads two kids sports/activities

SPOUSE B
* Works in office 2-3 days per week with great flexibility; contributes 3/4 of HHI
* Responsible for family finances including budgeting, retirement planning, bill pay
* Plans family vacations/trips
* Responsible for house and yard maintenance and upkeep including planning and coordination of contractors for large projects and hands-on work for routine maintenance and repairs
* Picks up and puts up groceries
* Cleans house in between cleaners visits to include vacuuming/mopping, bathrooms, dusting
* Packs school lunches and feeds kids breakfast
* Drops off kids at school and is the primary at-home parent (watches kids on no-school days, picks up kids when sick or early dismissals)
* Primary shuttle for kids weekend activities with occasional help from spouse
* Responsible for daily dinners every other week (mostly cooks from scratch meals)
* Coaches/leads two kids sports/activities

Just putting it out there that income should not matter if you are both working FT. Its division of labor.

Wild take. The low income spouse should quit their hobby job and bring down the work load on everyone.

In no world is making a quarter of a family's total income a "hobby" job. A hobby job is one that contributes know meaningful income to the family or even costs money. Also no hobby job involves 5 days a week in office unless we're talking part time, like someone spending 1-2 hours a day at a gym working as a personal trainer (while spending everything they make on workout gear) or 2 hours a day working for minimum wage at an art gallery or something. Literally any full time job is, by definition, not a hobby.

Also in a set up like this where one partner works a lower paying full time job in office with little flexibility and the other partner works a high paying but flexible job with a lot of WFH, the higher paying spouse is often an entrepreneur or in a more volatile field. This can make the lower paying spouse's job essential for both providing benefits and also as an insurance policy against the higher earner's risk of job loss or down years. My spouse's solid but not high paying government job served this purpose for years while I built my business, even in years where my take home was several multiples of his -- there is no way I could have built a business while also having small kids at home otherwise. So his job enabled mine even though mine was ultimately more lucrative.

Also the minute the lower paid spouse quit their job, the workload would increase overall because if you cut your income by 25%, say good bye to ever having house cleaners, any marginal childcare, any food options that cost a bit more but cut down on prep or stress, and now you have less for vacations, therapy, and entertainment, all of which help ease the burden of being a two income family.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:It seems kind of unfair to put down spouse A for making pre-prepared dinners when they WOH AND are responsible for getting kids to all their activities on weekdays.

Agree. This makes no sense at all. The WAH should do dinners, can just be crock pot or something simple. If I hustle to leave the office at 5, pick up kids from school and then get home. THEN I have to make dinner and then drive the kids to practice? This makes no sense. What is the WAH spouse doing at this time?

I guarantee that this is exactly what spouse A wants, for spouse B to pick up either meal prep or taking kids to activities since these are the hardest things for someone working full time in person to do, and spouse B resents it because, while they might not say it out loud, they believe their higher income should exempt them from these particular glamour-free parenting tasks. Even though logistically it makes way more sense for them to do them.

Just wait until spouse A finds out spouse B is using the time that spouse A is spending on driving the kids around and picking up dinner to work out, relax, or pursue a hobby. Because spouse B feels they are entitled to this leisure time, due to their income, whereas spouse A has to "pay the family back" for making less by doing more of the grunt work.

[Anonymous]

Why is the focus on time spent vs. value contributed?

We all know people who take 40 hrs to create 10 hrs worth of value. Seems that this situation is the same. The question should be value comparison, not time or task list comparison.

One of these spouses is obviously more easily replaceable than the other.

[Anonymous]

A fifth grader is perfectly capable of doing their own laundry.

[Anonymous]

What would you like to change? Take the W. My dh and I make 50/50, but I do most everything on your list.