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Gender Distribution: Paid and Unpaid Work



Gender Distribution: Paid and Unpaid Work

Since the 1960s, a substantial amount of research has been undertaken to take stock of the differences in the socio-economic status between men and women (Turner, 2000, 129-36). At the same time, mobilization and awareness-building culminated in international fora and, under the auspices of the United Nations, many governments committed to eliminate all forms of discrimination against women (Turner, 2000, 129-36). To document the progress made (or lack of), new conceptual frameworks were developed that made evident the need for gender-sensitive data collection processes (Oostendorp, 2004, 732-936). Thus came the great push forward for data gathering that allowed tracking of differences between girls and boys, women and men at the national level for both developing and developed countries.

In the decades that followed, research findings pointed out that ameliorating gender disparities in paid and unpaid work, a goal in its own right, is a contributing factor to promoting gender equality and also pro-poor growth, social cohesion, and improvements in overall human development. As a result, policy attention and resources were devoted to address gaps in health, education, labour markets, labour rights, and access to credit and markets (Turner, 2000, 129-36). These have been important initiatives and rising female labour force participation rates provide encouraging testimony to that end (Turner, 2000, 129-36).

Most importantly, unpaid care work entails a systemic transfer of hidden subsidies to the rest of the economy that go unrecognized, imposing a systematic time-tax on women throughout their life cycle. These hidden subsidies signal the existence of power relations between men and women; also, they connect the "private" worlds of households and families with the "public" spheres of markets and the state in exploitative ways (Oostendorp, 2004, 732-936).

Analytically speaking, people allocate their time to activities that can be classified as paid work, unpaid work, and no work. Leaving aside sleep time, the concept of "no work" is commonly understood as consisting of free time spent on personal care and leisure activities. A clear but often-neglected distinction must be drawn, of course, between "no work" as voluntarily chosen free time and "no work" as the outcome of enforced inactivity due to chronic lack of employment opportunities (Skoufias, 2001, 1090-1196). Paid work refers to time contracted out that receives remuneration. Work arrangements and the extent to which paid work is performed under decent conditions show extreme variations, with notable consequences on workers. Informality and lack of decent work conditions have received considerable attention worldwide by government and nongovernment organizations, trade unions, and the International Labour Organization (ILO), as well as academic researchers (Skoufias, 2001, 1090-1196). Labour market segmentation, wage differentials, unemployment, and labour force participation rates are also relatively well investigated subjects and national labour statistics departments routinely collect data on these issues (Oostendorp, 2004, 732-936).

"Unpaid work" includes all non-remunerated work activities and it is safe to say that it lacks social recognition. The overall division of time between paid and unpaid work depends upon many factors including age, gender, ...