Unequal Home Work: Educational Assortative Mating and Gender Inegalitarianism in Housework and Childcare in Japan

• In Event: Family Section Roundtables
  In Refereed Roundtable (60 minute): Table 11: Homogamy, Heterogamy, and Marriage

Abstract

Japan’s population crisis leads many to seek out potential explanations and solutions to slow or reverse the trend toward later and less marriage that is in turn connected to the country’s lowest low fertility. Theories of gender equity posit that the difficulty of balancing the demands of work and household/family responsibilities lead many to delay marriage (McDonald 2000). Given the persistence of highly gendered expectations in Japanese marriages, coupled with increasing heterogeneity in educational assortative mating, this study examines how educationally homogamous, hypergamous, and hypogamous marriages vary in levels of gender inegalitarianism. Using longitudinal data from the Japanese Panel Survey of Consumers, I find that hypergamous couples exhibit significantly more gender inegalitarianism compared to other couple types, though the effect is weakened when accounting for the effects of parenthood, which significantly reduces gender inegalitarianism. These findings offer greater insight into gendered marriage dynamics in Japan, which may have relevance for the future of marriage and fertility in coming years.

Author

• Ami Mariko Hood Frost, University of Oklahoma