Household tasks continue to fall to women, according to a recent report by the Social and Economic Council of Flanders (Serv) and reported by De Standaard.
The survey questions nearly 9,000 employees in Flanders every four years since 2004 about various things, including work-life balance. This year, it reported that one in eight people regularly experience work-life imbalances – the highest in the survey's history – and most of those people are women.
While self-reported work-life balance for men has not changed in the past twenty years, women employees testify to a sharp increase in work-life conflicts. The reason could be persistent gender stereotypes in which household and childcare chores are considered a woman's responsibility, even if she works full-time.
"A second work shift? For me, it almost feels like a third shift," Charlotte De Roey (33) told De Standaard. She is a mother to a toddler and an HR manager at a software company. "That's my first work shift. The second shift consists of daily care tasks: picking him up, giving him a bath, and taking him to daycare. I divide those tasks with my boyfriend. But the third shift is for me alone: all the tabs open in my head. Who notices that the pampers are running low? Who writes a thank-you card to the childcare workers during Child Care Week? Who still worries about that persistent cough and tries to get an appointment with the paediatrician?"
Persistent gender stereotypes
"It remains relatively accepted that women take on more responsibility in the household," Bieke Purnelle of Rosa, the knowledge centre for gender and feminism, told De Morgen.
Sociologist Ignace Glorieux also points out to De Standaard that though men contribute to the household in different ways, the tasks that usually fall to men are non-urgent chores that can be easily rescheduled or postponed.
"Typically female tasks are those that must be done every day, that cannot be put off: shopping, cooking, cleaning up, doing laundry. Men, on the other hand, take on tasks that are less time-constrained, that can wait a while: mowing the lawn, doing a repair [...] Because such tasks are easier to control and postpone, they are less likely to conflict with other work," he said.
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However, breaking out of these deeply ingrained behaviours is more complicated than one might think, even for well-intentioned partners. De Roey says that her boyfriend does try to unload some of the childcare and housekeeping tasks off her place, "but men don't realise that taking over something means taking it completely out of your hands. Not that you keep asking where the syrup is, or what size the pampers are again. It's not that he doesn't want to do that. But I think as a woman I just always think three steps ahead."
