The Truth About "Homemaking"

This was in response to a Quora question:

Let’s quit kidding ourselves about “homemaking.” It is NOT a job of any sort. It is not a real job because you do not get paid a wage in doing it. Since virtually all “homemakers”—I hate that word—are wives, they have to be dependent on a man in order to survive. He is not her “employer.” He is not having to pay anything to a wife that employers pay to their employees. A woman does not get unemployment if she is out of her “job” in the home. Her “skills” in the home are not valued by employers because what she is doing is not real work. What “benefits” she gets through her husband, including Social Security benefits, is for being a dependent and not a worker. Want further proof “homemaking” is not a job? Note that few men will lower themselves to doing it. It is drudgery. That should tell you everything about it. Women who have paying jobs are still doing the same thing as a stay-at-home wife, so are single parents. So, for the most part are single people of both sexes. Should they also be compensated for their “work” if “homemaking” is actually a “job”? Why should people who actually work subsidize what is in fact a lifestyle choice and not a “job” or a “career”?

Men give lots of lip service to “homemaking” only because that frees up more jobs for men when women leave the labor force. It also benefits men because then they don’t have to do all the drudgery in the home if they have a wife to do it and not complain.

Economists give lip service about the “value” of a “homemaker,” but it is all deceptive. It is designed to make women who opt to stay home feel good about their lifestyle choice. However, it doesn’t change the character of the endeavor. Women aren’t getting paid for this because chores around the house, including rearing kids, is not real work and is done also by those who have paying jobs.

Because it is a lifestyle choice, there is nothing wrong with it if you want to do it. Just don’t kid yourself that what you are doing is any kind of real work.



It always sticks in my craw when politicians go around and talk about how "caregivers" should get even more benefits from those of us who have to work for a living. It is just another subsidy for the well-to-do.