The secret tax on women's time

WHEN STUDIES REVEALED THE SO-CALLED PINK TAX, showing in 2015 that personal hygiene products “for her” cost 13% more than similar products for men, it caused outrage and action.

- LAUREN C. HOWE, LINDSAY B. HOWE, AND ASHLEY V. WHILLANS

But there is also an unaddressed pink tax on women’s time: a global epidemic of women lacking time to conduct the activities of their everyday lives that men simply do not experience. In fact, men have on average five hours more leisure time per week than women—equivalent to 260 hours, or 10.8 full 24-hour days, each year.

Our own research found it’s true everywhere. After a conversation with a mother of three from an upper-middle-class neighborhood of Johannesburg, our colleague Margot Rubin asked, “So you’re saying that there’s nothing outside of money, or time, that will make anything better?” She paused and said, “Yes.” In interviews with working mothers in the crowded and poor Kibera settlement in Nairobi, one lamented, “I have so much to do at home and I still have to go to work.”

Why is there this time inequality? At home, childcare and chores devour women’s time. At work, women—even those who have the security of steady employment—face further unequal time demands.