[lbo-talk] Why Is America So Violent?

joanna 123hop at comcast.net
Sat May 12 13:02:52 PDT 2007


Doug Henwood wrote:


> There was a thread about this a month or two ago - it's looking like
>
>the time crunch hypothesis is way overblown. Americans have quite a
>bit of leisure time - 4 or 5 hours a day. They just spend most of it
>watching TV.
>
I'm really not sure about that. In the U.S., I was a member of a family with a working dad (worked 8hrs/day, six days/week) and a stay-at-home mom. If my father had only worked five days a week, there really would have been lots of leisure.

But the leisure there was was mostly the effect of all the work my mom did, which meant that when my dad came home, he could put his feet up and do nothinig or do whatever he wanted.

I now head a single parent family (I'm the parent), and despite the fact that I work at home, which really minimizes hours worked and eliminates the commute -- I also have to do everything, so, no, I don't get much leisure time, and I don't watch TV at all.

I would say there are a lot of people in this situation now: either single parents or two job-families. There's also a lot of time to spend providing /finding services that just used to be there and now must be scavanged for or provided in some way.

Joanna



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