That has reinforced a sense among some men that their paid work takes priority over their wives’ jobs, leaving women to carry the bulk of household chores. Kataoka said, “then we cannot create a world in which women are empowered.”Ībout half of working women in Japan are employed in part-time or contract jobs without benefits, according to government data, compared with close to one in five men. “If we can’t split the work at home equally,” Ms. Yet many women are held back because they bear a heavy load at home. Japan’s prime minister, Shinzo Abe, has long promoted a platform of elevating women in the workplace. In a survey last year by Macromill, a market research firm, about half of Japanese working couples reported that men did 20 percent of the housework or less. And with schools closed in many countries, the extra strains from child care and imbalances in parental help with homework have surfaced around the world.īut men in Japan do fewer hours of household chores and child care than in any of the globe’s wealthiest nations. Japan is by no means the only place where women shoulder a disproportionate household burden. “If I refused to accept this, then we might face more resentment of each other.” Kataoka said during an interview on Google Hangouts from the family kitchen, where a printout of his wife’s spreadsheet was stuck to the refrigerator door. government’s response to Covid - and now to monkeypox. A Blunted Response : Major data gaps, the result of decades of underinvestment in public health, have undercut the U.S.Since then it has displayed a remarkable capacity to evolve new tricks. A Persistent Variant: Ten months have passed since Omicron’s debut.adults had heard little or nothing about it by mid- to late September, according to a new report. New Boosters: The updated shots were authorized at the end of August, but nearly half of U.S.Now, the pandemic has made them unwelcome, as Covid vaccine rates soar there. An ‘Anti-Vax’ Capital No More: Vaccine skeptics once found a home in Marin County Calif.Still, some men say they now feel closer to their families, and hope Japan’s often inflexible work culture will change sufficiently to allow them to spend more time at home even when the pandemic passes. And there are doubts that this dose of domesticity, which may be over in weeks, will open men’s eyes enough to reverse entrenched patterns. Living quarters are cramped, and feel even smaller with everyone stuck inside. The results can be combustible: Arguments sometimes erupt over whose turn it is to sweep up or help with math lessons for newly homebound students. Women who toil invisibly doing laundry, dealing with finances and cooking meals are now asking their husbands to pitch in. Men who usually see their families only briefly in the morning and at night have been spending weekdays at home during Japan’s coronavirus state of emergency, allowing them to witness just how many chores must be done. “I really wanted him to understand just how much I was doing,” she said.įor working couples, Japan’s efforts to combat the spread of the virus - encouraging teleworking and asking residents to stay inside - have highlighted disparities in the division of domestic work that shape households across the globe but are especially pronounced in Japanese society.
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