Unpaid housework and provision of care is still unequally distributed

According to the Swedish Government's gender equality goals women and men must have the same responibiltity for unpaid housework and provision of care.

This week, the Swedish Gender Equality Agency submitted a comprehensive follow-up and analysis of the goal attainment to the Government. We conclude that an equal division of unpaid care and housework has not been achieved.

For example, women do more washing-up, cooking, cleaning and laundry than men. Men perform more maintenance around the home such as paining and installing technology but these acitivites are performed only occasionally and does not compensate for the time women spend on housework.

Women also provide more care to their own children than men. They take more parental leave and are more likely to remain home from work to care for a sick child.

In order to improve goal attainment we recommend, among other things, to introduce a new gender equality bonus to increase incentives for parents to share parental benefits equally. This new bonus should stimulate a more even districution of beneftits during thee child's first three years.

The report on equal distribution of unpaid housework and provision of care (Livspusslet som inte går ihop) is available in Swedish including a summary in English.