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– I’m going in the first A.
Sverre Kvåle Platou goes on a scooter towards the Hvalstad school in Asker.
He is followed by older brother Sigurd, who is in the fifth grade, and his mother Randi Kvåle Iversen. Children also have a little sister. She is in kindergarten. Although the crown crisis is not over, the most arduous period is over, as most of it should happen in the home.
– There has been more of everything, from meals, schoolwork and housework. And he has become more me than him, says Randi Kvåle Iversen. She describes the distribution of work at home between her and the man after the government implemented strict coronary measures.
She explains that this is because she has been in a slightly different work situation than her co-inhabitants. He has had a home office while she searches for work.
– We usually have a 50/50 distribution in the home, but now it’s been a little different, she says.
Gender role pattern reinforced during the crisis
It is not only in this family that the distribution in the home has been different in recent months. Since the crown pandemic contributed to closing schools and kindergartens, layoffs, and increased use of the home office, the traditional gender role pattern has been strengthened.
– Yes, a little pointed, I think it is correct to say that. Women have increased the time spent on tasks that women say do most of the work before, says Lars Kolberg, senior adviser to the Hamar Equality Center.
The center investigated who did what in the home after March 12: the day a series of coronary measures were implemented. In the Opinion survey, a representative sample of Norwegian couples between the ages of 18 and 70 were asked questions about the home situation.
It basically means that a lot is shared equally
In the survey, women and men were first asked if some defined tasks are shared equally and if one of them has primary responsibility.
The responses reveal that men, more than women, think that various tasks are shared equally. However, between 40 and 50 percent of respondents believe that the couple shares responsibility for most household chores and chores related to children equally.
But the answer to the question of who has primary responsibility for a series of household chores reveals clear gender differences.
- Many women and men agree that women bear the main responsibility for the most part.
- The exception is maintenance, repairs, and transportation of children to and from activities.
Women do more than they think they have primary responsibility for
After the crisis occurred, the couples in question had free time by freeing up transportation to and from leisure activities and spending less time shopping for food. Even though both sexes say they have spent more time on other chores related to children and households, there is a clear gender difference when it comes to who they say they have used. “more time»About the activities.
The survey provides the following responses:
- Half of women with children have spent much more time babysitting, playing and activating children.
- Women have also spent much more time cooking, doing housework, and helping with schoolwork.
- This happened despite the fact that more men than women have been laid off or given a home office, and despite the fact that there are more women than men in jobs that define themselves as socially critical.
Two explanations: faceless
According to Kolberg, there are two different explanations for why this happened, and no one with two lines below.
– It appears that women spend much of their free time in the areas for which they believe they have primary responsibility. And then it seems that men take less responsibility at home, he says.
If the man has a home office, a higher proportion of women spend more time with their children than in the cases where the woman has a home office. For men, the opposite is true: they do more if they have a home office.
– This can be difficult to understand. My interpretation of this trend is that men do a lot when they can and should, and line up when they have time, while women do more anyway. Homework and children are still women’s work, although many couples report that they share the work equally, she says.
Kolberg says they would have liked to determine what kind of work day those who responded now have, but that has not been done. Therefore, it does not know if someone has a calmer or busier day than others, for example. Best time for laundry.
Both women and men are satisfied with life.
– We have had more time for each other during this period. There has been less stress. We have simply had a good time as a family, Randi Kvåle Iversen tells us about the weeks the family has left behind.
This feeling is shared by several.
Couples in the survey were asked how satisfied they are with life. On a scale of zero to ten, just over half of men and women answer eight, nine, or ten. In total, few people have answered ten, but among those who have, twice as many women as men.
– Yes, many couples with children believe that they have had more quality time. It may seem that the situation has provided a kind of respite for the children’s families in a busy everyday life, says Kolberg.
Political: not surprising
The survey results come as no surprise to Kristin Ørmen Johnsen (right), chair of Storting’s family and cultural committee, or to Ape’s gender equality policy spokesperson, Anette Trettebergstuen.
– I think everyone has thought about it, that the woman takes on the bigger chores at home and pauses the chore while running a home office, Johnsen says.
– The survey says something that we are not in line with gender equality. It is just another example that we have a long way to go. Therefore, comprehensive gender equality policy measures are still needed, says Trettebergstuen.
Long-term consequences?
Although Johnsen says it is up to each family how work is distributed, he also believes that more work needs to be done to ensure that women and men are treated equally at home. She questions whether men don’t release them, and whether women and men have different definitions of when, for example. It is clean enough in the kitchen.
Both are concerned about the long-term consequences of the division of labor revealed by the survey. Trettebergstuen asks if the division of labor can lead more women than men to take unpaid vacations, for example. autumn nursery start.
Johnsen says he has taken an initiative for the government to map the consequences of the crisis on gender equality. The findings will be presented to the Storting.
– We need a short and long term survey. Then we can discuss the results and see where to put the support, says the right-wing politician.
