Crisis Conversations: Sand and Diamonds — the pandemic upends the balance of labor at home

“Society views women's time as infinite, like sand, and it views men's time as finite, like diamonds.” - Eve Rodsky, author of Fair Play

For Stephen Dypiangco and his family, the coronavirus pandemic has completely turned life upside down and inside out, heaving schedules out the window and setting fire to established routines. But with the chaos has come a new found balance and personal growth. As a caregiver, he notices that his role as a father feels different, and as a partner, he has begun to see household labor and caregiving through the eyes of his wife, Ann. The pandemic has given them the space and time to talk about sharing the load more equally, allowing them to re-envision what that looks like within their home.

Around the world, women work outside and inside the home, performing a second, unpaid shift. In the United states, the unpaid work they performed in 2019 would have generated 1.5 trillion dollars. To meet the demands of caregiving and other household tasks, many women reduce the hours they work or walk away from the workforce entirely, meaning they have less income and financial stability. The gender gap in household labor means that women lose not only money, but also time and health, two irreplaceable resources. Research shows that on any given day, women in the U.S. spend 37 percent more time on household work than men, and when they burn out from carrying the invisible cognitive load, they experience negative health outcomes like exhaustion, declines in mental health, depression, irritability, and incidents of isolation.

This was the reality before the coronavirus pandemic struck. Now more than ever, it’s important that we challenge it. As Eve Rodsky, our guest on episode two of “Crisis Conversations–Live from Better Life Lab” said, “We need to value care in a way we didn’t before. Now we’re set up for a wonderful reset.”

According to Rodsky, author of Fair Play: A Game-Changing Solution for When You Have Too Much to Do (and More Life to Live), at the root of unfair division of labor in the home lies the question, “whose time is more valuable?” With more people at home, schools and care centers closed, social activities canceled, and work intensified, women are taking on an increasing number of tasks: more meals, more laundry, homeschooling, entertaining younger children, and the list could go on. The virus makes clear what has always been true, says Rodsky, namely that “society views women's time as infinite, like sand, and it views men's time as finite, like diamonds.”

So how do we ensure this inequality of time and labor doesn’t get worse during the pandemic? Rodsky explains that communication is a crucial step on the path towards changing who-does-what because it fosters trust in both partners and builds the foundation for ownership of tasks. When each person feels like a task is fully theirs, they follow through on the three critical steps - planning, managing, and execution - needed to accomplish it. While communication alone does not solve the problem of unequal divisions of labor, it is one important move towards sharing the load and promoting gender equality within the domestic space. Within the confines of their home, Stephen and Ann have taken the initial steps to rebalancing the load more fairly, communicating about their needs and expectations.

Prior to the spread of coronavirus, household labor in the Dypiangco home was unequally divided, and both Stephen and Ann wanted to change that. One area of success was groceries and food prep; they managed to split the load with the help of technology, using apps to keep track of their lists and plans online. However, Ann did a lot of the invisible labor around the home, work that went unacknowledged.

When it came to doing the laundry, Ann took care of it, knowing that there was a 50 percent chance that Stephen would get to it. It’s worth noting that the Dypiangcos actually really wanted to improve how they shared the work around the home, and made efforts to equalize the labor, but often ran into an obstacle familiar to everyone: a lack of time.

During the ebbs and flows of everyday life before the coronavirus pandemic, they struggled to tackle the topic of who-does-what, simply because they didn’t have the time to address it. Conversations came to a premature halt before ever really starting.

Then came the coronavirus pandemic.

By turning everything upside down, the pandemic created the urgency to reset roles and norms. Both Stephen and Ann now work from home, he as an entrepreneur and she as a therapist. Sharing more hours of the day together, they observe each others’ schedules and routine tasks. What once may have been easy to ignore, like the basket of laundry, no longer is. Because Stephen is around all the time, he can see when Ann performs household labor and how often. Put simply, the new reality of working from home and social distancing renders Ann’s invisible labor—visible.

In light of all that has now changed, Stephen and Ann realize that they have to talk about what Rodsky calls the “dirty dozen;” that is, the various chores that are causing families the most stress during the pandemic: laundry, dishes, groceries, stocking up on home supplies, emergency planning, meals, cleaning, facilitating kids’ friendships and social media, homework, and supervising children.

Today, Stephen has gotten into the rhythm of doing his share. When Ann takes some personal time to zoom chat with friends, he makes sure the kids take their showers and puts them to bed. Laundry is also something that he’s been taking care of. More importantly, he’s become a lot more aware of when his wife needs to take a break to rest, and understands how he plays a role in ensuring the household is functioning, something he may not have noticed before.

The coronavirus, with all the fear and anxiety it conjures, presents people with a unique opportunity to see their private spheres–their homes–with new eyes. Rather than maintaining the status quo, we can all choose to notice the invisible labor that so many women around the country (and world) have done and continue to do. By acknowledging it, we render it visible. When we recognize how much time and energy is invested in performing unpaid work, we can also begin to have critical conversations about what fairness in the home actually looks like and what we should do to promote it. Now is a good time to hit reset, challenge the status quo, and promote gender equality.

In the next episode, we’ll chat with attorney Rachel Deutsch about how the coronavirus pandemic has shut down businesses and left millions of people without work. We’ll hear stories from callers and talk about whether the coronavirus is speeding the future of work, and what that could look like. RSVP to join the community conversation.

To hear more of this episode including stories and questions from callers, click here. You can also find this episode wherever you listen to your podcasts. The video and transcript of the conversation are down below.