Unpaid Work: From Recognition to Transformation

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Unpaid Work From Recognition to Transformation

• by Diane Elson, Levy Economics Institute
• and University of Essex
• Presentation to Hawke Research Institute
• University of South Australia

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Questions

• Is it enough to recognize the economic and social
  value of unpaid work?
• Or do we also have to transform the social
  relations of unpaid work?

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Unpaid Work and the Market Economy
Business sector
Formal paid work
Informal Work Paid and unpaid
Public Sector
Formal paid work
Labour Services
Good and services and monetary flows
Non profit institutions
Informal work Paid and unpaid
Formal paid work
Volunteer work
Household Sector
Paid work
Unpaid work Subsistence Work Care Work
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Recognition of Unpaid Work

• Time Spent
• Monetary Valuation
• Social relations of unpaid work
• Unpaid work as creation and depletion of
  well-being

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Time Spent on Unpaid Work in Britain, 1999
Average Minutes per Day, population over 16 years
Providing Housing 46
Providing Nutrition 48
Providing Clothing 13
Providing Care 28
Voluntary Work 11
Shopping Appointments Gardening Pet Care 37 26
Travel 48
Total 282
Source Short, 2000, Office of National
Statistics, London
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Time Spent on Unpaid Work in South Africa,
2000Average Minutes per Day, Population 10 years
and above
Household Maintenance (including cooking, cleaning, etc.)
Care
Community Service
154
Source Budlender and Brathaug, 2005, Table 2
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Time Spent on Unpaid Work in India,
1998/9(combined average from 6 selected
states)Average Minutes per Day, Population 6
years and above
Unpaid Domestic Services (extended SNA) 160
Source Calculated from Chakraborty, 2005, Table 3
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Monetary Valuation of Unpaid WorkValue of unpaid
work excluded from GDP as percentage of GDP
UK 77 (output method, gross value-added by households as of GDP minus imputed rent)
South Africa, 2000 11 to 50 (input method, varying wage rates)
India, 1998/9 (for 6 states) 26 to 50 (varying by state) (input method, global substitute wage)
Sources UK Office for National Statistics,
www.statistics.gov.uk/hhsa/hhsa/index.html South
Africa Bulender and Brathaug, 2005 India
Chakraborty, 2005
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Unpaid Work Included in GDP

• In principle, measurement of GDP includes
  subsistence production, including food
  processing, collecting water and fuel, in
  countries where these are substantial activities
• In practice, GDP measures do not fully cover
  this unpaid work

Time Spent Collecting Water (average daily
minutes)
South Africa, 2000 11
India 41 (excluding travel time)
Sources South Africa Calculated from Charmes,
2005, Table 6 India Calculated
from Chakraborty, 2005 Table 6
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Reinforcing Patriarchy

• Unequal division of paid and unpaid work
• Disadvantages of specializing in unpaid work
  financial dependence
• Coercion, abuse and unpaid work

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Unequal Division of Unpaid WorkAverage Minutes
per Day by Sex
Total Male Female F-M
UK 282 202 318 116
South Africa 154 80 220 140
India 160 31 297 266
Sources UK Calculated from Short, 2000, Table
2 South Africa Budlender and
Brathaug, 2005, Table 2 India
Calculated from Chakraborty, Table 3
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Disadvantages of Specializing in Unpaid Work, UK
Examples

• Over 1/2 a million more women than men are living
  in poverty
• Women receive an average of just 54 pence for
  every 1 pound received by men
• Following divorce, a womans income is likely to
  decline by nearly 1/5, a mans income changes
  little

• 26 of employees work part-time, of these, 79
  are women. Part-time jobs are low-paid and lack
  pension benefits
• Hourly pay of women working part-time is 40 less
  than hourly pay of men working full-time
• Only 13 of todays women pensioners are entitled
  to the full basic state pension, compared to 92
  of men

Source Bellamy and Rake, 2005
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Disadvantages of Specializing in Unpaid Work,
South Africa and India

• Concentration in informal employment
• In South Africa, poverty rates of households
  headed by women, and in those in which the
  primary earner is female, are higher than in
  households headed by men, and in those in which
  the primary earner is male
• In India, in the mid 90s, a higher proportion of
  adult females than of males, lived in poverty

Sources South Africa Chen et al., 2005, Table
3.12 India Banerjee, 2000, quoted
in Elson and Keklik, 2002
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Subsidizing Private Profit

• Directly, via the Labor Market
• Reducing the wage costs of social reproduction
• Reconciling workers to the capitalist labor
  process enabling them to feel like human
  beings in a system that treats them like
  commodities (Picchio, 1992)
• Indirectly, via the State
• Reducing public expenditure
• And hence, reducing taxation
• Providing the Ultimate Safety Net
• Unpaid work as a buffer

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Unpaid Work and Public ExpenditureWomens unpaid
work funds public programs

• Peru
• Women run a public food distribution program
• Valued at the minimum wage, their contribution
  amounts to 20 of the budget for the program
• Netherlands
• Women volunteer extensively in public schools
  and hospitals
• South Africa and Barbados
• Government funding does not cover full costs of
  running shelters for women subjected to domestic
  violence
• NGOs, relying partly on voluntary labor, cover
  the gap

Source Elson, forthcoming
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Unpaid Work subsidizes health systems

• Improving the efficiency of public hospitals in
  Canada and the UK
• Home-based care for people living with HIV/AIDS
  in Africa
• Ethiopia Women spend 33.6 hours a week in
  agricultural production in households not
  affected by AIDS, but between 11.6 and 16.4 hours
  in households affected by AIDS (Bollinger, et al.
  1999)
• Zimbabwe Unpaid household carers provided 17.5
  24.5 hours of care per week. Estimated
  opportunity cost was 22 a month (Hansen, et al.
  1994)

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Dilemma How to Recognize and Value Unpaid Work
Without Reinforcing Patriarchy and Subsidizing
Businesses and Governments?

• Income tax
• Income transfers related to children
• Regulations and subsidies for parental leave

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Income Tax

• Should tax systems recognize the value of unpaid
  work by providing taxpayers with allowances for
  non-earning dependents who do unpaid work at
  home?
• Should tax systems instead provide households
  with tax allowances/credits to cover some of the
  costs of purchasing substitutes for unpaid work?

• If tax allowances/credits are related to
  childcare costs, how can the system be designed
  in ways that do not reinforce the idea that child
  care is solely the mothers responsibility?

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Regulations and Subsidies for Parental Leave

• Should we call for the right to longer maternity
  leave?
• Or the right to longer paternity leave, on a use
  it or lose it basis?
• How should parental leave be funded?
• Should it be funded on a flat rate or earnings
  related basis?

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Key Challenges

• Transforming unpaid work not just recognizing it
• Sharing it equally between women and men
• Supporting it by laws and public funding
• Treating it as wealth-creating by businesses