Barriers to reconcile work and family life
Work, home, children, food, shopping ... are some of the many tasks that parents have. We arrived from work, tired, and what awaits us at home is not precisely rest. In fact, most workers face a split working day, which reduces the time spent on family and home.
The main barriers to reconciling work and family life
For this reason, reconciling work and family life on many occasions seems unfeasible. A recent survey carried out by the company of domestic help services through Internet Helpling.es, has evaluated what are the main barriers that our current lifestyle imposes on us when reconciling family and work. Among the main conclusions, it stands out that 39% of Spanish respondents claim not to be able to combine both tasks. These are the main barriers that prevent a good conciliation:
1. Time for cleaning the home. Almost 33% say that their house was cleaner and cared for before having a child. These data reveal that only a quarter of respondents are able to reconcile work and family life without family or professional help.
We all know that with the arrival of the children in the family, a deeper cleaning is necessary to avoid germs and infections. That is why almost 40% of citizens say that since they are parents they are more careful with cleanliness than before, but still 12.4% acknowledge that, although they should do so, they are not capable due to lack of time.
2. Working time. Another survey, the Time Employment Survey conducted by the National Institute of Statistics reveals that we spend an average of seven hours and twenty hours on work, compared to the three and a half hours that we use to live at home.
In this sense, it is interesting to observe the difference that is reflected in the data of the INE between men and women with respect to the hours dedicated, on the one hand, to the work environment and, on the other, to the family: the men surveyed dedicate, of average, almost eight hours a day to work, and women about an hour and a half less than them. However, to the family and the home, the men dedicate about two and a half hours to the four hours and twenty-five that the women dedicate.
3. Difference of time between sexes. Although this difference between the sexes is remarkable, the time devoted to work and study by women remains stable, devoting half an hour less to domestic work. On the contrary, men reduce work and study time by more than half an hour. From this time, twenty minutes are spent on increasing their dedication to household chores. Therefore, in the last seven years men have reduced the difference with women in time of daily dedication to housework in 45 minutes.
After observing the data offered by the INE, we highlight certain variables. First, housework is done with the same intensity on both working days and weekends. On the other hand, men spend more time on Saturdays and Sundays, days in which women reduce their domestic load in five minutes. It is also important to know that the higher the income level of the household, the less time its members spend on its tasks.
It is important, in order to maintain balance in the home, that we try to give back to the family the time that work takes away from us. In most situations this is not easy, but we can always go to the help of a family member or professional to maintain this harmony of times and needs.
Sara Pérez
