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 If
you consider yourself an average American that means last year you
spent 8.6 hours a day sleeping, 3.7 hours working and devoted 5.1
hours to leisure time, half of that time watching television, according
to a survey. Tracking the days of working parents with little free
time to retirees and teenagers, the national study included a wide
spectrum of people. It was conducted to show that this "average"
day was the furthest from anyone's actual day.
The Marathon Schedules of Working Parents
(ages 25-54) spend:
- 8 hours a day commuting to and from their jobs
- 7.5 hours sleeping
- 2.6 hours on leisure and sports
- 1.3 hours caring for others
- 1.1 hours on household chores
Any extra time in the day was spent eating, shopping, attending
to personal hygiene and doing other miscellaneous activities.
A U.S. telephone survey conducted in 2003 asked 21,000 participants
how they spent their last 24 hours. The results confirmed some preconceived
gender speculations surrounding the amount of work women do around
the home, even in two-working parent households.
The Women Carry the Majority of the Household
Load:
- On any typical day, 84 percent of women do the housework, cooking
and managing household finances compared to 63 percent of men
- Women spend 2.3 hours of their day cleaning compared with 1.3
hours for men
Men were shown to make up for their slacking at home by working
more hours -- 8.3 hours compared to 7.7 hours for women. Men
also enjoy more leisure time, with 5.4 hours compared to the 4.8
hours for women. This number dropped to 4.0 leisure hours for women
with children under the age of six.
A Breakdown of Other Activities
- 41 minutes spent socializing
- 22 minutes reading
- 20 minutes on sports or recreational activities
- 20 minutes relaxing and thinking
- 17 minutes playing games
- 31 minutes spent on other leisure activities
Scientists are hoping to use these results as a way to put a price
tag on the amount of unpaid work as a measurement tool of total
economic output, income and productivity. They also want to use
it to evaluate American's quality of life.
Currently, U.S. gross domestic product shoots up when a family
puts a child in day care or sends their laundry to the dry cleaners.
On the other hand, the GDP drops when parents have to cancel day
care or spend time doing their own laundry.
Yahoo!
News September 15, 2004
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