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Getting Outside Help: How Trust Problems Explain Household Differences in Domestic Outsourcing in the Netherlands

^* To whom correspondence should be addressed. E-mail: e.de.ruijter{at}aoconsult.nl.

	Abstract

This article examines the influence of trust problems on the use of domestic outsourcing by couples from a gender perspective. The authors argue that trust problems matter in outsourcing decisions, because an outsider enters the privacy of the household and takes over tasks of special value. Analyses of data from a survey among 740 Dutch couples show that trust problems faced by female partners influence the outsourcing of female tasks, and the same reasoning applies to male partners. Partners who are more trusting toward others are more likely to outsource own-gender tasks. Conversely, greater skills reduce the trust problem for opposite-gender tasks, that is, men’s skills increase the likelihood of outsourcing child care, whereas women’s skills increase the outsourcing of home maintenance.

First published on September 16, 2008, doi:10.1177/0192513X08324579

Journal of Family Issues 2009;30:3.

A more recent version of this article appeared on January 1, 2009


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