In 2019, the population aged 14 and older dedicated an average of 16.8 hours per week to household chores or caretaking of persons, with 21.4 hours per week for women and 11.0 hours per week for men. From 2016 to 2019, this difference between the male and female averages increased from 9.9 to 10.4 weekly hours.

In 2019, 146.7 million persons aged 14 and over performed household chores, equivalent to 85.7% of this population. The percentage of women who do these tasks (92.1%) is still much higher than that of men (78.6%). In 2018, these percentages were 85.6% (total), 92.2% (women) and 78.2% (men), with a change of 0.4 percentage points in men's rate.

Carrying out household chores is more common for men with a higher degree (85.7%) and less common among those with no schooling or incomplete primary education (74.1%).

The Northeast showed the greatest gap in the rates of domestic chores by sex (21.0 percentage points more for women) and the South, the smallest (9.6 pp more for women).

The rates of household chores done by white (91.5%), black (94.1%) or brown (92.3%) women are always higher than those of men of the same color or race groups (80.4%, 80.9% and 76.5%, respectively).

Among the seven activities investigated as household chores, the only one in which men surpass women is Small repairs at home: 58.1% for men and 30.6% for women.

Subsistence production was carried out by 12.8 million persons aged 14 and over, or 7.5% of the population in this age group. The rate for this activity was higher among men (8.0%) than among women (7.0%). Among persons aged 50 and over, the rate is three times higher (10.6%) than that of young persons aged 14 to 24 (3.2%).

In 2019, 54.1 million persons aged 14 and over took care of residents at home or of non-resident relatives, with a rate of 31.6%: 36.8% for women and 25.9% for men. Caretaking was provided mailny to residents aged 0 to 5 years old (49.2%) and 6 to 14 years old (52.0%).

Nearly 4.0% of the population aged 14 or over (or 6.9 million persons) did volunteer work in the week of the survey. In 2018, this rate had been 4.3%. The region with the lowest rate of volunteer work was the Northeast (2.9%) and the highest rate was in the South (4.6%).

The rate of voluntary work performed by women (4.8%) was higher than that of men (3.2%). About 90.7% of the people who did volunteer work did it through an institution, organization or company.

Those are some of the highlights of the supplement Other Forms of Work, of the Continuous PNAD 2019. It comprises: household chores at home or at a relative's home; the caretaking of children, elderly, sick persons or of those with special needs, either residents or non-resident relatives; subsistence and voluntary work. They are unpaid activities that are not part of other modules of the Continuous PNAD.

Rate of household chores is the lowest among youngsters

The rate of household chores also varied according to age groups. The participation of youngsters aged 14 -24 is the lowest (76.9%) and of adults is 25 t o 49, the highest (89.2%). This trend is true in both sexes: the lowest was that of men aged 14 to 24 years old (67.8%) and the biggest was that of women aged 25 to 49 (95.5%).

But the group of men aged 14 to 24 recorded the highest growth in the rate between 2018 and 2019 (1.4 pp), going from 66.4% to 67.8%; whereas the participation of women in that same group had a slight reduction, going from 86.6% to 86.4%. This age range, although the lowest in household chores, is the one which has grown more since 2016, adding up in the period to a difference of 8.3 percentage points for men and of 3 pp for women.

Regardless of color or race, the rate of carrying out household chores by women is bigger

In 2019, 87.6% of blacks and 86.4% of whites did household chores, whereas among browns the rate was 84.7%. The highest rate occurred among black women, of 94.1%, against 91.5% of white ones and 92.3% of brown ones. The rate of household chores by white women (91.5%), black ones (94.1%) or brown ones (92.3%) is always higher than those of men of the same color or race group (80.4%, 80.9% and 76.5%, respectively).

The rate of household chores increased with schooling level. In 2019, the rate was of 81.9% among the persons with no education or with incomplete primary school and of 90.3% among those with complete higher, a difference of 8.4 pp.

In that same comparison, the discrepancy is bigger among men. The difference between the rate of those with lower schooling levels and those with higher education was of 11.6 pp, whereas for women, that difference was of only 3.8 pp. From 2018 to 2019, the group of men with complete primary education and incomplete secondary education presented the greatest growth of the rate, 0.9 pp.

Children or step children had the lowest rate of household chores (74.8% in the total, 66.5% among men and 84.8% among women).

The difference among men and women was bigger for spouses (14.8 more for women) than for household heads (8.7 pp more for women), and even higher for children or step children (18.3 pp for women).

Small repairs is the only activity that men carry out more than women

In 2019, the activities related to feeding, cleaning of clothes and shoes and house cleaning were still very concentrated on women, whereas the carrying out of small repairs in the house was the only activity in which the percentage of carrying out was bigger for men (58.1%) than for women (30.6%).

In their own housing unit, the activity with the highest participation rate was preparing and serving meals, setting the table and doing the dishes (81.0%), followed by house cleaning and tidying (77.4%), going shopping for the home or checking prices (76.2%) and cleaning of shoes and clothes (75.3%).

The activity whose percentage was the lowest was the rate of small repairs or maintenance in the housing unit, car, etc. (42.6%), followed by pet caring (47.7%).

From 2018 to 2019, the activities that grew the most were pet caring (2.5 pp), house cleaning or tidying (1.2 pp) and going shopping or price checking (1.3 pp).

Rate of chores for men living alone equals that of women

The analysis by type of chores by status in the household shows that the carrying out of chores by men is only the same as that of women when they live alone. When they live together, i. e., as a household head or spouse, the carrying out of chores by men declines significantly for certain activities, except for small repairs in the housing unit. On the other hand, for women there are no big differences in the carrying out of certain household chores according to their status in the household and to the fact they live alone or not.

North and Northeast have the biggest differences by sex in caretaking

In 2019, 54.1 million persons aged 14 and over engaged in caretaking of residents or non-resident relatives, which corresponded to an engagement rate of 31.6%, a little below the estimate for 2018 (31.8%).

Those chores included helping with personal care, school activities, playing, monitoring or taking to school, to the doctor, to exams and others.

The caretaking rate was differentiated by sex. Whereas 36.8% of women claimed to do caretaking, among men, the rate was of 25.9%.

The biggest caretaking rates occurred among women and men in the North Region (41.2% and 27.7%, respectively) and the lowest, among the women in the South (35.2%) and men in the Northeast (24.1%). The biggest differences between the rates for men and women were in the Northeast (13.7 pp) and in the North (13.5 pp) and the lowest one, in the South (9.0 pp).

Mostly children received care

Caretaking is related mainly to the presence of children in the household. The recipients of that care were mainly the residents from 0 to 14 (almost 50%). Elderly caretaking occurred in 10.5% of the cases, increasing 0.8 percentage points in relation to 2018. Thus, in 2019, the age group with the highest rate of caretaking was the one from 25 to 49 years old (43.4%), both for men (36.9%) and for women (49.3%).

Nearly one fourth of the persons ages 14 to 24 years old undertook caretaking in 2019. Over 50 years old, the rate falls to one fifth.

The analysis of caretaking by color and race shows that black (33.7%) and brown persons (33.0%) had a higher rate than white ones (29.7%). Around 40% of the brown and black persons undertook that type of work whereas among white persons the rate was at 33.5%.

The rate of caretaking changes according to level of schooling. The rate was lower among those with no education or with incomplete primary school (26.3%) and greater among persons with complete secondary education and incomplete higher education (35.3%).

In relation to the status in the household, the lowest caretaking rate is among children or step children (22.5%), whereas the biggest one, among spouses (40.1%), either men (34.2%) or women (42.7%).

The activity support for personal care, including feeding, dressing, combing, giving medicine, bathing and putting to bed, are still very much in charge of women: 85.6% of them undertake those tasks, whereas among men the rate is 67.9%. The support in the school activities also presented the greatest difference (11.1 more for women).

Women dedicate almost twice as men's hours to household chores

In 2019, the population aged 14 years or older dedicated an average of 16.8 hours per week to household chores or to caretaking, with 21.4 hours per week for women and 11.0 hours per week for men. From 2016 to 2019, this difference between the male and female averages increased from 9.9 to 10.4 weekly hours.

Working women dedicated 8.1 more hours per week to chores and care

Women unemployed outside the home devoted an average of 24 hours a week to these tasks, while unemployed men dedicated half of that time (12.1 hours a week). Employed women, on the other hand, devoted an average of 8.1 hours more to chores or care at home than employed men.

The Southeast Region showed the largest discrepancy in the average hours devoted to chores or care between unemployed women and men (12.8h) and the Northeast, the biggest difference between employed women and men (9.1h).

The carrying out chores and/or caretaking by women tends to reduce their working time at a job by an average of one hour a week, whereas for men, chores and/or caretaking increases by an average 0 .4 hours the workday in relation to the ones that do do not do chores and/or caretaking. In the North, the difference in hours dedicated to a job by women who do not do chores or caretaking reaches 3 hours a week.

Employed persons engage more in voluntary work than the unemployed ones

In 2019, 6.9 million persosn aged 14 years and over did volunteer work in the reference week of the survey, equivalent to 4.0% of this age group. This engament rate was 0.3 percentage points lower than in 2018 (4.3%), which is equivalent to a reduction of 281 thousand people among those who did volunteer work in the period.

The region with the lowest percentage was the Northeast (2.9%) and the highest, the South (4.6%). Between 2018 and 2019, there was a reduction in all regions, especially in the Central-West (-0.7 pp).

The rate of voluntary work was higher among women (4.8%) than among men (3.2%) and among black persons (4.8%) than among white (4.5% ) and brown persons (3.5%). The rate among employed persons (4.5%) was higher than that of non-employed persons (3.5%).

The rate increases with both age and level of education. People aged 50 and over had the highest rate (4.7%), as well as people with complete higher education (7.6%).

Most people who did volunteer work did it through a company, organization or institution (90.7%), a proportion 0.5 pp higher than in 2018. In addition, 79.6% did it through the religious institutions, unions, condominiums, political parties, schools, hospitasl or asylums and 11.9% did it through a neighbor associations, sports clubs, NGOs, support groups or other organizations.

As for how often voluntary work was carried out, 46.4% of the perosns did it four or more times a month. However, between 2018 and 2019, this was the only figure that decreased (2.0 p.p.), for voluntary work done once a month increased (1.0 p.p.).

However, there was an upward trend in the time dedicated to this activity (6.6 hours per week), mainly in the Central-West (0.7 hours). The Southeast region was the only one to show a reduction in the average hours dedicated to voluntary work (-0.3 hours).

Subsistence production is more common in the North, Northeast and South

In 2019, 12.8 million persons aged 14 and over, or 7.5% of the population in this age group, worked for subsistence. Although there was a reduction in this activity in all regions, in relation to 2018, Northeast (10.7%), North (9.8%) and South (9.4%) had the highest rates. Central-West (6.6%) and Southeast (4.5%) were below the country's average.

The rate of subsistence production was higher among men (8.0%) than among women (7.0%). Among persons aged 50 and over, the rate is three times higher (10.6%) than that of young persons aged 14 to 24 (3.2%).

About 13.3% of uneducated persons or those with incomplete elementary education produce for their own consumption, while among those with complete higher education the percentage is only 2.7%.

The rate of subsistence work was higher among the unemployed (8.6%) than among the employed (6.5%).

Among the activities of production for own consumption, Farming, fishing, hunting and animal raising was the most common (77.9%), both among men (81.4%) and among women (74.3%). And this was the only activity that had an increase in the percentage of achievement (1.2 p.p.) - the Production of charcoal, cutting or collecting firewood, straw or other material had the greatest decrease (-1.3 p.p.).

Only in the Manufacture of footwear, clothing, furniture, ceramics, food or other products was the percentage of engagement higher among women (25.2% of women compared to 0.9% of men).

In terms of hours dedicated to consumption, Construction had the highest average in all regions, ranging from 13.9 hours per week in the Northeast and Southeast to 16.6 hours in the North. The time dedicated to cultivation in the Northeast (12.6 hours) was well above the estimate for the other regions.