BUT. Should two able-bodied folk pay someone else to clean their small flat? Surely we should be able to handle cleaning a few square feet of space without having to hire staff! This brings up all my vague 'bleeding heart liberal' tendencies and also my Scrooge-like thrifty tendencies. I feel a bit uncomfortable about it all.
BUT we both hate cleaning while liking things to be clean. And I'm sure the cleaner would be quite happy to have another couple of hours work a fortnight. We'd make sure we paid a fair wage so we're not exploiting them.
I don't know - what do you think? Is it immoral to hire someone to do something you're perfectly capable of doing yourself?
First, if you pay a decent wage it is in fact moral to provide work for someone. Second, I question that you are going to get thorough cleaning (floors, bathroom, kitchen- including stove and occasional cleaning of fridge interior-, dusting, etc. in two hours, every fortnight. So, another aspect of "doing it right" is giving the person enough time to do the work- another hour, at least. It's not a moral question, the question is how you want to spend the finite hours of your life.
ReplyDeleteGood point about giving enough time (or a small enough To Do list). We'd have to work that out. We do have a tiny flat and I was thinking of the basics i.e. vaccum and mop, clean the bathroom. I never clean the oven (and I don't mind that it's not clean). The kitchen benches etc. get wiped regularly anyway.
DeleteAbout the moral/ethical side, somehow I inbibed a set of views about things that it's okay to spend money on versus things that it's extravagant to spend money on. My parents had a cleaner when I was a teenager, but it just feels extravagant, somehow. I might have to get over it and just give it a go.
Perhaps you call them cooktops- I did not mean oven.
ReplyDeleteAh, I see what you mean. Hmm... I think stove probably refers more to the top bit but can refer to the whole thing over here. I just skipped straight to thinking about the inside bit 'cos I look at cleaning the top bit as automatically included in wiping the benches.
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