Ana Hernández, 54, knows she is a rare bird right now. She wasn’t one 30 years ago, nor was she 20 years ago. But now she is. She did like many women of her generation: get to work, get married and, once her first child was born, leave the world of work to take care of the little one. Then came the second. Transfer from a small town in the north to Madrid, schools, extracurricular, children’s vacations… “I didn’t go back to work, I didn’t even think about it. But I recognize that I am a minority because even those my age who were housewives, found themselves with a divorce that forced them to go to work ”, she explains.
And it is true that Ana is part of an increasingly smaller group, at least among women. In twenty years, the group of housewives has been reduced by almost two million, currently standing below three million (2,892,200), according to data from the first quarter of this year from the latest Active Population Survey (EPA). It is not the first time that it has fallen below three million in a quarter, but the reduction registered in 2022 compared to the first quarter (100,000 fewer housewives) suggests that the trend will continue in 2023, and even be sharpen. “It is an activity in clear decline,” say the experts.
The same does not happen with the group of housewives who, although they have always been a minority and testimonial compared to that of women, the reality is that in these two decades it has increased by more than 350,000. Currently there are 445,000 men who deal exclusively with housework and child care compared to 89,000 in 2002.
This is the case of Andrés L., 46 years old, married with two daughters, who three years ago hung up his pilot’s license to take care of domestic chores. His wife, an engineer, spent years “putting aside any professional aspirations while the girls were little.” Until she was offered a managerial job that requires traveling every week and “that she couldn’t refuse.” And so they made the decision for him to stay at home, taking care of the home. The decision was clearly influenced by the fact that she had a “very good salary” and “we decided that I would leave mine to take care of the girls until they finished their studies. Because my partner is away all week and I, with mine, was also missing a lot. And we were clear that they should be with one of their parents.
Ana and Andrés are a clear example of what is happening in Spain since entering the 21st century. Fewer and fewer women stay at home taking care of domestic chores, while men, although in a much smaller proportion, join this profession without remuneration. And both cases, the experts point out, have to do with the higher level of training of women. They study to work and not to stay at home.
That, the youngest. Middle-aged women have also chosen to enter the labor market to contribute more to the family economy, especially since the 2007 crisis, according to EPA data prepared by the INE.
For Marisa Soleto, director of Fundación Mujeres, the data shows a clear social change. “It is the change of women. We come from generations of mothers and grandmothers whose mission was to dedicate themselves to caring for the family as their main responsibility and working outside the home was something accessory”.
And he continues: “Young women have also assumed that staying at home implies a future of poverty and hardship (minimum pensions). That is clear to them because they have seen it in their mothers and in their grandmothers”.
Does less housewives imply greater equality? “No, it is a social change for women, but it does not imply greater equality. Because, although after finishing their studies and beginning their working life the activity rate between men and women is very similar, the same is not true when the first child is born. So they either take a break in their working life, or reduce their working hours, making their situation more precarious”, points out Marisa Soleto.
In fact, 30% of women who return to the job market after having their first child do so part-time. As for men, the percentage drops to 8%. After the first year of maternity, women’s salaries are cut by 11%, but men’s are unchanged, according to the Gender Gap report from the Fundación de Cajas de Ahorros (Funcas). And he adds: more than 85% of the leaves of absence for care that are requested in Spain are for women.
