Housework affects employees' earnings

Chores. We all do them-some of us more than others. New research by Joni Hersch, a law and economics professor at Vanderbilt University, found that the time we spend on trips to the grocery store, cooking, cleaning, child care, pet care, and lawn and garden maintenance can actually reduce our average wages by about 24 cents per hour for women and about 21 cents per hour for men.

And ladies, if it feels like your husband never lifts a finger around the house, you're just about right. Women spend 53 percent more time on housework than men. And this housework has a negative impact on women's salaries, regardless of occupation.

In contrast, chores lowered men's wages in only a handful of occupations: management, business, financial operations and sales-related positions. In Hersch's study, just 24 percent of the men were employed in these fields.