Empowering women at work? Let’s start at home

Modern India is rewriting its labour laws and promoting women’s economic empowerment with unprecedented urgency. Yet the old expectations remain untouched. The biggest pressure on modern marriage is this mismatch between new economic realities and the older gender scripts that still govern roles, power, and identity. This tension is hardly unique to India. Across continents, marriages are strained by the unspoken assumptions couples inherit about who should earn, who should sacrifice, and who should decide.

In The Gambia, Aissa, 37, divorced her husband shortly after discovering he had taken a second wife – legal under local custom but a violation of the private bargain she believed they shared. Law and religion mattered, but the deeper fault line was the unspoken “deal” she thought existed. When that implicit contract collapses, couples fall back on inherited norms, turning homes into quiet battlegrounds.

India’s story, different in specifics, is similar in structure. When Riya, a fintech employee in Bengaluru, received a promotion, household finances improved, but domestic harmony frayed. Her husband joked about having “two bosses,” while his parents questioned why she needed to work late when “their son already provided.” What appears as family teasing is better understood as the old cultural script asserting itself: a “good” wife sacrifices and understands; a “good” husband guides and controls.

These scripts shape women’s participation in India’s economy just as the government urges women forward. Women make up only one in three participants in the labour force – a modest rise but far below most major economies. Economists usually explain this gap through supply and demand: job availability, skills, or discrimination. The new labour codes promise safer workplaces, extended maternity protections, and formalisation of employment. Prime Minister Modi praises women as pillars of national development.

Yet public policy and private belief often move in opposite directions. New research shows that many Indian husbands hesitate to support their wives’ employment because they fear a shift in decision-making power at home. To preserve their status, some discourage wives from working, insisting it is “not the right time,” blocking opportunities, or invoking childcare concerns.

Crucially, these fears rest not only on tradition but on misperception. In one study, Indian men overestimated community disapproval of women working by more than 20 percentage points. When shown the actual attitudes – that peers were more supportive than assumed – their resistance softened.

Meanwhile, women continue to shoulder the heavier burden of the domestic economy. Indian women perform 288 minutes of unpaid household work a day, compared with 88 minutes for men, and spend roughly twice as much time on unpaid care. This imbalance reflects the old bargain in which a “good” man provides materially while a “good” woman supports emotionally. But as economic realities shift faster than identities can adapt, tension follows.

Some assume that women’s rising incomes will ease this strain. The evidence is mixed. A 2025 study of 500,000 Indian households found that dual-earner couples in which the woman earns more report greater marital conflict. International data echo this: across OECD countries, couples often report lower marital satisfaction when the woman is the primary earner. The problem is not women’s earnings, which often keep households afloat, but the outdated ideal of male breadwinning. Thus, as women earn more, household finances may stabilise, but male self-worth may wobble.

At the same time, the public performance of marriage grows louder. Families in India may spend up to 30% of their lifetime savings on a wedding. Yet the ceremony says nothing about post-wedding negotiations: who handles chores, whose career bends, whose ambition counts. An economy has been built around the wedding, but not around the life that follows.

Globally, the old gender contract is dissolving. In The Gambia, known for older European women seeking romantic or transactional relationships, younger men or “bumsters” offer companionship in exchange for gifts or migration. In the West, it’s not uncommon for successful Indian women to marry lower-educated white men who take up domestic chores while women remain breadwinners. Economic change is rewriting possibilities faster than cultural expectations can adjust.

What would it take to craft a healthier “new marriage deal”? First, treat gender norms as hard economic constraints. Shifting men’s beliefs – through religious leaders, educational messaging, or workplace training – can make it respectable, even aspirational, for men to share earnings and care. Second, update institutions. Even as India promotes women’s work through new labour codes, tax systems, pension rules, and public-safety structures reflect a male-breadwinner model. Finally, couples must do the quiet work of negotiation. Saying “I let my wife work” frames employment as a concession; calling women’s earnings “extra” frames them as expendable.

Women’s economic progress depends on shared responsibility at home. Only when men share the work of the home can women fully share the work of the world.