Google “housework women men,” or anything similar, and you’ll be bombarded with dozens of headlines telling you fathers aren’t doing enough. But liberal media bias aside, if we take a closer look, what the research actually shows is that fathers do as much for their families as mothers do.

In 2020, the University of Michigan Institute for Social Research (ISR), the world’s largest academic survey and research organization, cited data showing that men contribute as many hours of work to their families as women do, and have for at least the past five decades. The Pew Research Center even found “fathers’ overall work time (including unpaid work at home) is actually two hours more than that of mothers.”

How do we square research with perception? Women’s advocates and sympathetic media focus not on overall contributions to a household, which includes housework, childcare and market work (paid employment), but specifically on housework and/or childcare. The greater burden that men bear as family breadwinners — a burden that remains, even when women are working full-time jobs — is downplayed, when not ignored entirely. 

Mothers are full-time homemakers in over a quarter of families with children, and are four times as likely to work part-time as employed fathers are. Mothers work full-time in 46% of two-parent families.

Given those statistics, the gender dynamic in work between mothers and fathers is simple, and exactly what one would think: The more hours one parent works in the market, the less they work at home, and vice versa. According to Pew, “parenting and household responsibilities are shared more equally when both the mother and the father work full time than when the father is employed full time and the mother is employed part time or not employed.”

Yes, even when mothers and fathers are both working full-time, mothers are still doing more domestic labor than fathers. But even when mothers are employed full-time in the market, fathers still work more. According to the US Bureau of Labor Statistics, in households where both mother and father work full-time and there is a child under 18, fathers work 6.4 hours a week more than mothers. 

Moreover, the research only measures hours worked, without noting the special contributions of men who do dangerous and physically demanding work. According to the BLS, 92% of workplace fatalities are suffered by men. Men also spend 31% more time commuting to work each day than women do.

Overall, the gap between men and women’s housework and childcare is closing, but there are good reasons why it remains.

None of this means that the situation for mothers doesn’t demand change. When fathers are the breadwinners and mothers are working part-time or only in the home, it often has long-term negative effects on women when they return full-time to the job market. 

What is holding mothers back? Leaving aside personal preferences, lack of childcare is a major stumbling block.

Mothers are more likely to work full-time rather than part-time in states that have more affordable childcare, longer school days and universal pre-K. Today the cost of childcare for two children exceeds the average rent in all 50 states and the average mortgage in 45. 

This drives mothers away from full-time work and market work altogether because, after childcare and taxes, work often provides them only a modest financial gain.

For decades, women’s advocates have asserted that women often find paid employment more satisfying and worthwhile than housework, and they’re often correct. But this is a middle-class perspective. While housework may seem tedious compared to white-collar jobs, It is often preferable then compared to blue-collar work.

Some women are quite vocal in their desire to not do formal work, but to instead spend time on other aspects of life. They often proclaim so on social media. This is understandable, but do we imagine that breadwinning fathers don’t sometimes feel the same way? 

It should also be recognized that just as many mothers value their opportunity to be home with their children, many fathers would like more time with their kids, and wish they had the opportunity. 

All in all, through breadwinning, childcare and, yes, housework, dads do what they need to do for their families. Happy Father’s Day.

Glenn Sacks’ columns on fathers and fatherhood have been published in dozens of the largest newspapers in the United States.

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