|
Korean Job Discussion Forums
"The Internet's Meeting Place for ESL/EFL Teachers from Around the World!"
|
| View previous topic :: View next topic |
| Author |
Message |
Fox
Joined: 04 Mar 2009
|
 Posted: Thu Sep 17, 2009 7:57 pm Post subject: Female Happiness Decreasing? |
 |
|
Article here.
Small clip from the article that summarizes it fairly well:
| Quote: |
All told, more than 1.3 million men and women have been surveyed over the last 40 years, both here in the U.S. and in developed countries around the world. Wherever researchers have been able to collect reliable data on happiness, the finding is always the same: greater educational, political, and employment opportunities have corresponded to decreases in life happiness for women, as compared to men.
It feels strange to write that sentence, as though I'm mistyping or having a "backwards day," as my daughter would say. But I'm not. Though the trends in the data certainly don't suggest that all women are less happy as compared to men than they were back in 1972, the fact is that, across more than a million people, the trends are there, and they are going in the opposite direction than most would have predicted. And the sizes of these trends are meaningful. According to Stevenson and Wolfers, if you assume a strong link between being unhappy and being unemployed (which there is--the longer you're out of work, the more depressed you become,) the decline in women's happiness is as if women's unemployment has risen from 10% to 18%. |
The article itself is more in depth, obviously, and has some data. |
|
| Back to top |
|
 |
caniff
Joined: 03 Feb 2004
Location: All over the map
|
| Posted: Thu Sep 17, 2009 8:00 pm Post subject: |
|
|
| Back in the kitchens, ladies. |
|
| Back to top |
|
|
Big_Bird
Joined: 31 Jan 2003
Location: Sometimes here sometimes there...
|
| Posted: Thu Sep 17, 2009 8:08 pm Post subject: |
|
|
| I haven't read the article, but might it have something to do with the fact that we still usually shoulder far more of the domestic burden than our partners? It's hard to be happy when you have no free time and you fall into bed every night feeling absolutely exhausted. |
|
| Back to top |
|
|
caniff
Joined: 03 Feb 2004
Location: All over the map
|
| Posted: Thu Sep 17, 2009 8:13 pm Post subject: |
|
|
| Big_Bird wrote: |
| I haven't read the article, but might it have something to do with the fact that we still usually shoulder far more of the domestic burden than our partners? It's hard to be happy when you have no free time and you fall into bed every night feeling absolutely exhausted. |
Maybe we should live separately except for certain events like bumping uglies.
I seem to recall that some Native American tribes had men and women living in different wigwams (I think this happens in some modern day indigenous cultures, as well), and it apparently worked for them.
Thoughts? |
|
| Back to top |
|
|
geldedgoat
Joined: 05 Mar 2009
|
| Posted: Thu Sep 17, 2009 8:24 pm Post subject: |
|
|
| The majority of people are happy when they're given a role to fulfil and the opportunity and encouragement to do so. Men can still be the breadwinners and the protectors. Unfortunately, women who try to seek out their traditional roles are usually met with harsh criticism, mostly from their fellow women. |
|
| Back to top |
|
|
mises
Joined: 05 Nov 2007
Location: retired
|
| Posted: Thu Sep 17, 2009 8:26 pm Post subject: |
|
|
| Big_Bird wrote: |
| I haven't read the article, but might it have something to do with the fact that we still usually shoulder far more of the domestic burden than our partners? It's hard to be happy when you have no free time and you fall into bed every night feeling absolutely exhausted. |
Men will be perfectly happy working long hours in tough jobs involving physical labour. They too will return home and fall into bed exhausted. And they'll find emotional satisfaction from it. Work, for men, is life.
Do you believe in evolution? And before you answer with something silly, please think about evolution. We are not blank slates. We are a species that has evolved and is evolving. What has changed in the past 40 years is that we now deny any biological relationship to any aspect of our lives, our relationships and our roles. I was standing in an elevator today with a young mother who was completely infatuated with her kid. I am not capable of the emotions she was putting on display. It was something far, far beyond love. The farther women are removed from that - the reason they exist biologically - the more unhappy they will be.
However, I do not deny that women have a second shift that men tend not to have and that this second shift will leave them tired. But there is nothing more pathetic than a middle aged, unmarried, childless woman who stares with violent envy at the new mother in her presence.
But you're a nutty lefty and I'm a nutty righty, so we'll not agree. |
|
| Back to top |
|
|
Fox
Joined: 04 Mar 2009
|
| Posted: Thu Sep 17, 2009 8:29 pm Post subject: |
|
|
| Big_Bird wrote: |
| I haven't read the article, but might it have something to do with the fact that we still usually shoulder far more of the domestic burden than our partners? |
The article claims female happiness has decreased despite the fact that the portion of the domestic burden men on average carry has increased.
| Quote: |
| For example, between 1975 and today women's housework hours declined from twenty-one per week to seventeen, while men's jumped from six to thirteen. |
The disparity is less than it was 30 years ago, and women are supposedly less happy than they were 30 years ago. |
|
| Back to top |
|
|
Fox
Joined: 04 Mar 2009
|
| Posted: Thu Sep 17, 2009 8:32 pm Post subject: |
|
|
| geldedgoat wrote: |
| Unfortunately, women who try to seek out their traditional roles are usually met with harsh criticism, mostly from their fellow women. |
This definitely does happen at times, unfortunately. |
|
| Back to top |
|
|
Big_Bird
Joined: 31 Jan 2003
Location: Sometimes here sometimes there...
|
| Posted: Thu Sep 17, 2009 8:43 pm Post subject: |
|
|
| Fox wrote: |
| Big_Bird wrote: |
| I haven't read the article, but might it have something to do with the fact that we still usually shoulder far more of the domestic burden than our partners? |
The article claims female happiness has decreased despite the fact that the portion of the domestic burden men on average carry has increased.
| Quote: |
| For example, between 1975 and today women's housework hours declined from twenty-one per week to seventeen, while men's jumped from six to thirteen. |
The disparity is less than it was 30 years ago, and women are supposedly less happy than they were 30 years ago. |
How is this measured, I wonder? I remember research showing that self-assessments of how much work a man and woman do can be very innaccurate. For example, a man would pick up a fallen towel and consider that 'housework' whether a woman would just do this without thinking and not acknowledge it. I know my husband thinks he's done the lionshare of the work just for bathing the kids in the morning. He doesn't seem to notice that I am the one who ran around washing and selecting and ironing the clothes that the kids then wear. Or that feeding the kids is a hell of a lot harder and time consuming than popping them in the bath and pouring water over them a few times (people who have spent time trying to feed a 2 year old will know what I'm talking about). And what is 'housework' exactly? And how is it divvied up? I don't mind mowing the lawn. I find it a hell of a lot less stressful than trying to get the kids washed dressed and fed. Are there really households where the man does 13 and the woman does 17? Or are all those extra 7 hours of hou | | |
FAQ
Search
Memberlist
Usergroups
Register
Profile
Log in to check your private messages
Log in
