• Who's Doing the Second Shift in Recession Land?

  Posted Monday, February 23, 2009 11:53 AM | By Emily Bazelon
  
  
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  Thanks to a bunch of great e-mails from readers (you are a smart and articulate bunch), I posted a piece about the recession and its potentially deleterious effect on marriages. I've got a follow-up question: If your husband or wife has been laid off, or if you have, is that affecting how you and she or he divide up who picks up the kids, does the dishes, takes out the trash, pays the bills? Is the person who's newly staying home putting in more hours on what's known as the "second shift"—the time for domestic chores that working spouses put in at either end of the day? Traditionally, women have shouldered more of this burden. Even as their rates of full-time employment have risen, the time-use numbers showing that men do less around the house have stubbornly refused to budge. I wonder if this round of layoffs is changing that. Please send your stories to doublex.slate@gmail.com, and I look forward to hearing them. E-mail may be quoted in Slate unless the writer stipulates otherwise. If you want to be quoted anonymously, please let me know.
  
  Filed under: gender differences, economy, Recession, layoffs, second shift
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