Have you ever had the feeling that once you start house cleaning there seems to be no end? You’re not alone. A study found that in Britain people spend an average of five hours a week cleaning their homes. Women actually spend more time overall cleaning than men. They spend on average 5hrs and 25 minutes cleaning the house as opposed to men who clean just under 4 hours. Britons spend over £ 1 Billion pounds annually on cleaning products.
From the stats one could see that the work is not equally divided. Seven out of ten women claim to be doing a greater share of the housework than their partners while only four out of ten men made this claim. Among families, only one in five adult children helped out with housework while this figure was even less among children under eighteen.
So what do people spend so much of their time cleaning? It turns out that people spend most time cleaning toilets and kitchen surfaces. However, in the same survey most people did not deep clean their carpets even though 90 percent of people had carpet in their homes. Carpets actually harbour quite alot of germs so it is ironic that they are the most neglected.
Some people allot specific days for cleaning, while others cleaned their homes daily. One person did washing up to six times a day. If you have a large two story house the cleaning is usually twice as hard as a single story house. Some do a little every day rather than alot on some days.
One partial explanation is that people are increasingly busy so they have less time to spend on housework. This is why the market is producing more effective products to reduce cleaning time. If cleaning is easier then this will encourage family members to participate more in cleaning chores. This may also help to address the gender imbalance in cleaning chores. Cleaning companies could have special campaigns to encourage more household cleaning among men and other non-participating family members. Finally, it could be an option to employ outside help, provided cleaning companies can make this affordable.
Time-Lapse: Room Cleaning (home)