The San Jose Mercury News reports that unemployed husbands are picking up work around the house.

An estimated 2 million wives are now the sole breadwinners in families across America, since more men than women have been laid off in this recession, according to the Center for American Progress. Experts say that unemployed husbands probably are taking on more of the housework and child care duties — for now. But they don’t expect that temporary change to stick around if men find work again.

A sociologist weighs in on the trend:

“When men make more money, they can buy out of housework in a way women cannot,” says Constance Gager, a sociologist in the Department of Family and Child Studies at New Jersey’s Montclair State University.

Gager, who has studied the division of labor in families, says that while men have taken on more housework and child-rearing over the years, women typically still do two-thirds of it, including diaper-changing, bathing the kids, preparing meals and shuttling children to activities. Men tend to play with children or participate in athletic games.

However…

“I think the complicated question is: Do women want men to take over these burdens? It’s also the case that women feel a kind of propriety relationship to those tasks,” says Katherine Newman, professor of sociology and public affairs at Princeton University.