European women are still tied up in apron strings

Domestic chores are holding women back from breaking into senior management positions across Europe.

In the first study of its kind since new countries joined the European Union (EU) in 2004, researchers from Cambridge University polled 30,000 workers across all 27 member states. They found that, as women are still responsible for most household duties such as cleaning and childcare, their overall working day is significantly longer than men’s — which prevents them from working the long hours typically needed to break into top management jobs.

Brendan Burchell, who led the study, considers that women are in a vicious circle. “Because women are rarely the highest earners in the household, there seems to be an economic rationale for making them responsible for domestic duties,” he explained. The way to break this cycle, he says, is to “reduce gender inequality in employment and the household altogether — for instance, by encouraging men to take their parental leave entitlements.”

The study also revealed the persistence of gender segregation, with women over-represented in areas such as clerical support jobs and caring professions while men dominated the armed services, skilled crafts and senior management.

Burchell added that the researchers were “struck by how little the results for the longer-standing EU nations like Britain, Germany and France have changed.”