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FURTHER MECHANIZATION OF HOUSEWORK


	This section is problem-initiated rather than idea initiated.
Therefore it is more tentative than sections based on solutions looking
for problems.

	We start with the assertion that it is worthwhile to look for
technology that will allow the further mechanization of housework, and
we start that with a survey of where we were 100 years ago and where we
are today.

	A hundred years ago, there were two kinds of households.  There
were a certain number of nuclear families with a breadwinning husband
and a wife who did all housework and took care of the children and no
other working people in the house.  This was possible but very strenuous
for the wife.  Besides this, there were extended households with several
workers.  These extra workers might include grown or half grown children,
girls who were "in service" as well as male servants.  I don't know the
proportions of people who lived in the various kinds of households.  Today,
many people deplore the passing of the extended household.  In accordance
with a principle discussed elsewhere in this book, I will attribute rationality
to people unless there is evidence to the contrary, and therefore we
conclude that the passing of the extended household is evidence that
it was disadvantageous to some people required to keep it going.  It is
easy to guess who these people were.

	In the first place, we have the people who would have had to become
servants in the older society, but who were able to become factory workers
in a more manufacturing-based society.  I don't have the statistics, but
I would guess that the large families that some people had were balanced
by a large number of people who were never in a position to have families
at all.  This is suggested by the phrase "in a position to marry" which
tells us that getting enough money and a suitable job to be able to
marry was not trivial and was not always achieved.  It would be interesting
to know what percent of the population ever got married at various times
in nineteenth century America and Europe.


	In the second place, the extended family was normally very hierarchical,
and people who faced positions at the bottom of the hierarchy preferred
their own nuclear families to the positions they could get in the extended
families.  The older generation was often disappointed when the children moved
out rather than taking their places supporting the extended household.
Perhaps, one might even say that the main use to which Americans put the
great increase in productivity was in breaking up the extended household and
allowing everyone to form his own household on reaching maturity.  This
process is still continuing.  Children leave home at earlier ages in increasing
segments of the population.  Even the tendency of students to move out of
dormitories and into their own apartments is a part of this same tendency.

	This breakup of extended households has been made possible by two
kinds of technological development.  The first is a general increase in wealth
and the second is specifically domestic technology.  It seems that the first
is probably the more important, since it is quite feasible to have a nuclear
family with very little of the present domestic technology, but it is rather
difficult without money.

	The increased general wealth has permitted the construction of many
more houses and apartments per capita than was previously possible.  Secondly,
it has permitted a much less efficient use of food than previously.  Highly
prepared foods are used, and the inefficiency of preparing food for a small
number of people is tolerated.  The transportation system can handle the
increased fraction of the population not working where they live.

	The specifically domestic technology includes the following:

	1. Central heating which eliminates chopping firewood, bringing
it in, and laying and feeding fires.

	2. Running water which saves going to the well or pump.

	3. Sewage connections which save building and moving outhouses
and saves emptying chamber pots.  Maybe this is one of the main reasons
why it is possible to have reasonable luxury for some without having
a class of people who can be relegated to emptying chamber pots and
similar duties.

	4. Refrigeration which permits shopping at longer intervals.

	5. Electric lighting which eliminates some chores.

	6. Automobiles which eliminate the work of taking care of horses.
Historically, horses were mostly used as transportation by people who
had other people to take care of them.

	7. Washing machines and dryers.  It is doubtful that these reduce
work much over that involved in using laundries.  However, they certainly
make possible a less fixed schedule.

	8. Dishwashing machines that lighten the load of doing dishes.

	The foregoing has dwelt solely on the labor-saving aspects of
domestic technology.  The motivation for adopting this technology, and
its adoption consists mostly of a large number of individual and family
decisions to purchase one or another gadget or service, is not solely to
save labor.  For example, refrigeration permits better meals in many cases
and not merely meals prepared with less labor.

	Our use of these advantages to spread out into suburbs has forced
us to accept some other demands on our time.  These include

	1. Commuting longer average distances.

	2. Longer distances to shopping than in old-fashioned cities.

	3. The need for chauffering children.

	Well, let's summarise where all these developments leave us.  

	The amount of work required to keep up a household is usually
to small to occupy the full attention of even one person except when
there is more than one small child in the house.  However, it is enough
so that people generally live more comfortably when there is a person
whose main energies are devoted to keeping house.  Moreover, a certain
fraction of women keeping house would rather be doing something else.
It is not clear how large this fraction is.

	It may be possible by improved domestic technology to reduce the
work required to keep house to a trivial level.  What is a trivial level?