Economics: the key to happy couples' division of labor

Housework-who does what, when, and how often-is the source of many a recurring marital complaint. Splitting chores 50/50 often seems like the answer, but couples who do often find themselves as resentful and unhappy as couples who set up no plan for dividing the work that makes a house run.

The reason lies in basic economics, say authors Paula Szuchman and Jenny Anderson of Spousanomics: Using Economics to Master Love, Marriage, and Dirty Dishes. Splitting the dishes, laundry, vacuuming, and other household chores may seem fair, but an unbending line right down the middle can lead to more friction, not less, because no one is good and fast at all things. But when couples adopt the economic principle of "comparative advantage," which says it's not efficient to take on every task you're good at, only the ones you are relatively better at, couples can gain time for the things they really want to do, the authors write.

"In economics, having the comparative advantage in something means you produce it at a lower cost and really quickly," Paula Szuchman said in an interview with Yahoo! Shine. So if one of you is better at laundry, then do it. And if the other can do the dishes and clean up the kitchen faster every night

, while the better cook cooks, go for it.

The authors, both accomplished journalists (Szuchman: Wall Street Journal and Anderson: New York Times, where she spent years covering Wall Street and delivered award-winning coverage of Merrill Lynch) decided the time was right for an economics-approach how-to for a successful union for a few reasons. One was a pretty tough first year of marriage for Szuchman, who was surprised it was harder than she thought to merge two lives and that "something as banal as housework could get in the way" of all the fun she heard people were having being married. Another was the prevalence of economic terms suddenly in the national lexicon at the time of the financial meltdown. All at once, terms like "moral hazard" and "loss aversion" were all over the news to help explain a seemingly unexplainable economic freefall. "There seemed to be some useful parallels," Szuchman said.

So if you've tried making charts, keeping score, nagging, and/or letting resentment silently bubble up inside, and nothing's working, here are some tips gleaned from world-renowned economic theories that just may do the trick.

1. Have an honest talk about what tasks each of you is better at. Applying "comparative advantage," make an honest assessment of which chores you truly do better and faster than your spouse. It may mean switching tasks that were set either along stereotypical lines or based on what you like doing over others. (Though, really, who "likes" doing the dishes daily?) As Szuchman says, marriage is all about allocating scarce resources-"limited time, limited libido, limited money, and the question is, 'how do you allocate it all well?' "

2. Gain new specializations. If you love being outside but have never mowed a lawn, it may be time to master the mower. If you spend tons of leisure time on the computer, maybe bill-paying should fall under your marital to-do's. The lesson, Szuchman says, is that sometimes you have to each invest time learning new tasks to shake up a division of labor that's not working. Be flexible.

3. Let go of perfection. Or what you think perfection is. If your husband takes over the laundry, for example, don't refold what he folds. And if your wife is stacking the dishwasher every night, don't rearrange where she puts everything. "Once you divide it all this way, it's really important to let go," Szuchman said.

4. Fair doesn't have to mean equal. Whether it's because of comparative advantage or because one spouse works out of the home and the other at home, many couples will not have an even-split division of labor. Sometimes one partner is just looking for some give, an extra break from their responsibilities, for married life to feel more balanced. "Life need not be a fifty/fifty split for each person to be happy," Szuchman and Anderson write. "It could be sixty/forty, or seventy/thirty, or even ninety-nine/one, depending on the people, the situation, and the willingness to put away the calculator and give and take based on what really works best rather than what we think should work best."

5. If kids come along…. Once you've ironed out all disagreements/agreements of splitting chores between the two of you, get ready for some new battles over what chores the kids should do, and how to make sure they follow through on their 'assignments.' Number 3 applies here all over again. Don't remake your tot's bed once he's old enough to include it in his daily to-do's. That sends the wrong message.

"In marriage everything is a trade-off," Szuchman says, citing another economic term. "There's a lot of thinking at the margin," which is another way of saying making decisions based on small changes in resources. See, economics is everywhere in a marriage.

Check out an interview with Spousanomics authors Paula Szuchman and Jenny Anderson on Yahoo!'s Tech Ticker.