The Death of the Chore Chart
Children now spend 25% less time doing chores around the house than they did 20 years ago. It's not that they're spoiled--their parents now rely on outside help, and kids are expected to spend more time studying or participating in extracurricular activities. But what effect will this have on them as adults? A piece in the Wall Street Journal posits that these little boys might grow up to be aggravating husbands 'cause the Modern Woman needs a mate who helps with the housework. More interestingly, whether or not children do chores is a big predictor of whether they will volunteer in their communities as adults. Anybody have anecdotal evidence that supports this?
I also spend 25% less time doing chores than I did 20 years ago. That's because I made the recent conscious choice to do other things with my life rather than scrape the dinner dishes of a family of six. I have not regretted this choice. Viva technology, feminism, and college education!
I require my boys to get the toys off the floor before the cleaning service shows up. I require them to clean up any public space they use (parks and whatnot) in any way, even if the garbage is not theirs. I require them to carry as many of the groceries into the house as I do.
I do not believe that lack of chore assignments is directly related to lack of sloth or service in adults.
I believe lack of sloth and service, as well as whiny grown-ups, is more directly related to overmothering by real mothers and surrogate ones (wives/husbands), lower societal standards of achievement, homegeniety of neighborhoods, suburban sprawl, pervasive mass media and mass culture, isolation from the process of the actual production of goods and services, and, consequently, an extended adolescence that is partly characterized by lack of pride of ownership in one's own life.
I have a Marxist boyfriend.
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