Housework and caregiving moved differently

The surveys allow us to look inside unpaid responsibilities rather than treating them as one undifferentiated block.

For this comparison, the population changes to everyone aged six and over. It therefore includes girls and boys as well as adults. Across that population, females' average time in unpaid domestic services fell from 243 to 236 minutes a day between 2019 and 2024. Their caregiving time rose from 37 to 47 minutes. Male domestic-service time moved from 25 to 24 minutes, while caregiving increased from 11 to 13. These are averages per person, including nonparticipants. MoSPI, 2019, Statements 5–7; MoSPI, 2024, Statements 1–3

Adding the two rounded female averages gives 280 minutes in 2019 and 283 in 2024. A headline about falling housework time would miss the increase in caregiving. Looking at both categories together changes the interpretation.

Caregiving participation also rose for both sexes, with females continuing to report higher participation. The survey cannot tell us from these totals alone whether this reflects different care needs, changing household arrangements, greater recognition of care, or other influences. It gives us a clearer question to investigate.

That matters because activities placed under the broad heading of unpaid work may respond to quite different conditions. In a hypothetical household, a shorter meal-preparation routine could coexist with more time caring for an older relative. The household could save time in one activity while facing greater demands in another. An aggregate total would conceal that rearrangement.

Care can carry affection and obligation together. Its duration leaves questions about choice and support open. A decline in one activity is therefore not an automatic improvement: what changed alongside it, for whom, and under what circumstances?

Once those tasks are separated, another question follows: whose average day are we looking at?