Study: Girls work more at home than their brothers

It has long been true that women are paid less than men at work and do more of the labor at home. It turns out those patterns start as early as childhood.

Although there are a few signs that the gap is shrinking, a variety of data shows that girls still spend more time on household chores than boys do. They also are paid less than boys for doing chores and have smaller allowances.

One recent analysis, for example, found that boys ages 15-19 do about a halfhour of housework a day, and girls about 45 minutes; and that while girls spend a little less time on chores than they did a decade ago, the time that boys spend has not significantly changed.

Shouldering more responsibilities at home is a big reason women are paid less than men and fall behind men in their careers, researchers say. Achieving equality, they argue, will require not just preparing girls for paid work, but also teaching boys to do unpaid work.

“Being involved with the household from a young age is how most children learn these skills,” said Sandra Hofferth, a sociologist at the University of Maryland who was a co-author of the recent analysis and has spent her career studying how children spend their time. “Progressives believed that they were training their boys for greater involvement in the home. However, we do not see any evidence that the gap in household work has declined.”

Her research was based on American Time Use Survey diaries from 2003 to 2014 by 6,358 high school students 15-19. Housework included cooking, cleaning, pet care, yard care and home and car maintenance.

It found differences based on parents’ education. Children of college-educated parents spend less