# Do you currently have "household servants"? **URL:** \ **Category:** In My Humble Opinion\ **Created:** [April 29, 2016, 12:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-you-currently-have-household-servants/753414 "2016-04-29T12:18:28Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 11\ **Page:** 3
**Author:** ![Maastricht](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/a88e57/32.png) [@Maastricht](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Maastricht)\ **Post date:** [May 1, 2016, 6:47am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-you-currently-have-household-servants/753414/41 "2016-05-01T06:47:08Z")
My cleaning lady comes three hours a week. She straightens up, cleans the house, and irons all the weeks laundry into neat closet-ready stacks. I love her and pay her 16 euro’s, about 20 bucks, an hour. I also have a gardener who comes in two days a year to do the heavy tree pruning. No lawn. ---
**Author:** ![KinkiNipponTourist](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/e9bcb4/32.png) [@KinkiNipponTourist](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/KinkiNipponTourist)\ **Post date:** [May 1, 2016, 7:02am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-you-currently-have-household-servants/753414/42 "2016-05-01T07:02:39Z")
Cleaning lady comes once a week. I pay her $110 to do laundry, vacuum and wash all the floors, dust, change sheets, clean the bathroom and kitchen and wash the curtains. She loves on my fat cats for free. She also makes me a nice lunch every Friday. I live in Tokyo. ---
**Author:** ![Starving\_Artist](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/aeb1de/32.png) [@Starving\_Artist](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Starving_Artist)\ **Post date:** [May 1, 2016, 7:22am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-you-currently-have-household-servants/753414/43 "2016-05-01T07:22:36Z")
> [@Peremensoe](#): > > Paying for occasional services is not the same as having servants. This. Full time gardener = household servant. Some guy who shows up every week or two and cuts the grass = independent businessman delivering a service. Same for occasional maid services, dog walkers, etc. ---
**Author:** ![Colibri](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/colibri/32/1841_2.png) [@Colibri](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Colibri)\ **Post date:** [May 1, 2016, 5:20pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-you-currently-have-household-servants/753414/44 "2016-05-01T17:20:50Z")
I have a cleaning lady who comes in every two weeks to do the laundry, iron shirts, and tidy up in general. She has a key and has worked for me for 24 years. I pay her $25 for probably about 5 hours work. (I’m not in the apartment when she’s here.) This is a pretty good pay rate for Panama. The minimum wage is about $2.30/hour. ---
**Author:** ![Northern\_Piper](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/northern_piper/32/5304_2.png) [@Northern\_Piper](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Northern_Piper)\ **Post date:** [May 1, 2016, 5:57pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-you-currently-have-household-servants/753414/45 "2016-05-01T17:57:39Z")
> [@BrotherCadfael](#): > > I am sure our cat considers my wife and I to be servants. Add in one Piper Cub, and you’ve described our household. ---
**Author:** ![Count\_Blucher](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/c5a1d2/32.png) [@Count\_Blucher](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Count_Blucher)\ **Post date:** [May 1, 2016, 7:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-you-currently-have-household-servants/753414/46 "2016-05-01T19:46:57Z")
Just [one.](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dQltwDoyM5s) ---
**Author:** ![KarlGrenze](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/dbc845/32.png) [@KarlGrenze](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/KarlGrenze)\ **Post date:** [May 1, 2016, 7:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-you-currently-have-household-servants/753414/47 "2016-05-01T19:51:43Z")
Well, my dog cleans some of the stuff thrown on the floor. If you count gardeners, once a month or so my landlady brings some gardeners, and they clean out the weeds and my yard too (provided I pay for that part). But I do that because I hate garden job and don’t have a lawnmower here. ---
**Author:** ![Alessan](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/alessan/32/465_2.png) [@Alessan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Alessan)\ **Post date:** [May 1, 2016, 8:01pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-you-currently-have-household-servants/753414/48 "2016-05-01T20:01:54Z")
Does a building superintendent count? Technically, he works for the landlord, not the tenants. ---
**Author:** ![bump](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/7c8e57/32.png) [@bump](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/bump)\ **Post date:** [May 2, 2016, 3:47am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-you-currently-have-household-servants/753414/49 "2016-05-02T03:47:50Z")
> [@bump](#): > > We have a lawn service that comes and mows/trims the yard as needed (weekly in the summer, bi-weekly in the fall/spring, and monthly in the winter), and we have a couple of cleaning ladies who show up every other Wednesday and do more heavy-duty type cleaning like scrubbing out the tub, etc… versus the normal vacuuming and counter-wiping, etc… that we do. > > I used to do all the lawn care myself, before we had kids, but hired the lawn service after our first son was born, as fitting lawn care in between work, kid stuff and sleeping was going to be hideously onerous and unpleasant. I figured that this was definitely a case where if I could afford it, I should do it. I want to note that our yard guys mow, weed-eat and trim the hedges, and we do the actual picking up/straightening up in the house, and the cleaning ladies do stuff like scrub the tub and walls, clean the toilets, sweep/mop, etc… We do our own laundry, and we sweep/vacuum about every day or every other day. It’s like \*\*Oredigger77 \*\*said; losing the time on the weekends doing the periodic stuff was driving us crazy- we can usually keep up with the daily stuff. ---
**Author:** ![Mudshark](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/f04885/32.png) [@Mudshark](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mudshark)\ **Post date:** [May 2, 2016, 4:04am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-you-currently-have-household-servants/753414/50 "2016-05-02T04:04:02Z")
We don’t. I live with my grandparents, and they had a cleaning lady who came three days a week for almost 20 years. ---
**Author:** ![actualliberalnotoneofthose](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/e79b87/32.png) [@actualliberalnotoneofthose](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/actualliberalnotoneofthose)\ **Post date:** [May 2, 2016, 5:54am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-you-currently-have-household-servants/753414/51 "2016-05-02T05:54:08Z")
Since there have been threads here that claimed in a previous generation everyone was either a doctor/lawyer or servant themselves, I would be more interested in knowing how many people here ARE servants. By this definition if you own a landscaping company or provide a service of any kind at someone’s home you ARE a servant. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-you-currently-have-household-servants/753414.md?page=2)