Something that Pearson briefly mentions in "Reassessing Paid Work" is the concept of wages for housework. (This is located on page 210 for reference.) Pearson says this ended up being an "essentialist and radical feminist fantasy" but she also ties this in to how 'work' is inherently a gendered concept. Often, stay-at-home moms are not thought of as having jobs, and no, they do not have a formal job. They also do not have an informal job, if we go by the definition from Whitson's article, which says "Informal work deals with legal products and services, although the production or distribution of these products or services is either illegal or unregulated" (162). However, I feel that the general definition of work excludes housework and adjacent reproductive labor, and this is inherently sexist and to the detriment of what women do. We heard examples from the readings and from discussion where men say "oh our wives do nothing with their time, besides walk ten miles to get water, cook for five people, take care of the cattle, watch three children, wash all the clothes, etc" and this is a harmful way of thinking as it minimizes women's contributions.
Salary.com does an annual survey of housework that women do (for the US), and for 2013, they felt that, on average, a stay-at-home mom would be paid $113,568 / year and that a working mom would be paid $67,436 / year if the housework they did was priced on the labor market. While the Wages for Housework campaign originated in the Global North (in London), the most prominent effects of this idea have been seen in the Global South. Venezuela currently has a law that pays full-time mothers a pension. This law has other provisions regarding employed mothers that are very progressive. India was considering a similar wages for housework law, but I cannot find anything more recent on it, nor can I find any other examples. These laws, if put into action, could be used as development tools for government. However, because of the attitudes towards women's reproductive labor, in many countries it would be laughable to even suggest such a law.
Here are some links for more information on wages for housework: Global Women's Strike, Counter-Planning from the Kitchen, Wages for Housework: The Permanent Reproductive Crisis, Pay people to cook at home (NYT).
Jillian—Thank you for posting this. The concept of compensation for housework is one that I grew up hearing about. As a child my mother chose to stay home with us children as my father took on the primary bread- winner role in the household. When my mother was feeling under appreciated by my family she would always tell my father if he had to pay her for her work he would never be able to afford it. I remember thinking as a child how ridiculous that concept seemed, but after assuming some of the basic responsibilities of adulthood I understood. I could not imagine being responsible for multiple people all of the time.
ReplyDeleteI agree with Jillian’s point on the minimization of the importance of women’s work. The way that gendered roles have historically been constructed in most societies “house work” and child rearing are made out to be basic assumptions and expectations in womanhood. It seems that the role of caregiver is so magnanimous with the role of being a woman its value is constantly under appreciated. Pearson and many other authors we have read this semester, talk about the intensified work burden that working women experience. Pearson also mentions that the expectation of the woman’s role as caregiver (reproductive role) generally remains unchanged no matter increased economic means. I think it is also important to mention the criticism that this subject draws from men and women alike. I have heard conversations among my cousins; practically shaming one another for not being able to perfectly execute the dance of mother, wife, friend and working woman. I think it is important to acknowledge the time and work that is put into running a home and a family. Unfortunately a capitalist market makes it difficult for people to value anything that does not have a monetary amount.
It was interesting for me to read both of your comments while started to count how many times the word "work" has been used. Coming from the rhetorical background, I have been fascinated by the power of words even though most of the time we find out that words are powerless (e.g. "there is nothing more I can say"). But literally, words form different worlds for us. I remember those articles that we read two weeks ago (although not as quite clearly as I was during that time) how men talked about things that their wives do or even the women themselves described what they did at home as "things," or "women's things" but not use the word "work." We are born and socialized into this system which puts so much values on the word "work." When you ask people what they are doing, their answers will have an influence on how we think about them to some extent. It might not necessarily be that we will judge them, but we will have different values attached to what they said based on our own experiences, believes and understandings to certain type of works, etc. It is also interesting when I just looked at words "work" and "housework." It is like we are talking about "man" and "woman," and also "male" and "female." You see the pattern here right? Words that used to describe women are like something as subcategory under men's umbrella or an attachment to men. Usually at this moment, the radical feminism rings its bell in my head and says, "Let's tear off the word 'work' and create a new word for what women have done at home." But then, the question will be--Do we really solve the problem here? Or, we just use man's standard to judge man and give woman another standard. Then what can we do? Sitting there and watch?
ReplyDeleteThe idea of compensating women for housework is interesting. As we have read before in class, household work is often taken for granted as a "free" service provided by women in the home. One major reason women are not compensated for housework likely has to do with the fact that it is difficult to keep track of the value of housework. Yet housework inevitably contributes to healthier homes, healthier families, and healthier children. Healthy children are more likely to grow into productive members of society. So clearly there is value to work done in the home.
ReplyDeleteThe Wages for Housework campaign referred to in that New York Times article that you linked provides a useful insight into the logic behind compensating women for housework. Selma James’ view is an interesting divergence from what I generally think of when it comes to feminism. Her approach is an alternative from the push to get more women into the workforce. Women do often end up working a “second shift” inside the home even when they do work outside of the home. While I can understand why James’ idea was ignored, I think compensating women for housework could be incredibly beneficial. I do not think that it would reinforce the idea of women belonging in the home. Rather, I think it could possibly provide women with more options.
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ReplyDeleteI really like the housework annual survey, thanks for sharing it, Jillian.
ReplyDeleteI believe that such analysis needs to be in the core of feminist scholarship. I believe this because of three reasons, first, such studies, if conducted, will not only give us a better sense of the lord of work women carry out in their homes, but it will also correct the misconception of men who believe that cooking, cleaning, bearing and caring children is not “work”. Second, it will help women, especially house wives, not to take for granted their share of responsibilities at home, for example, I have heard many house wives saying “ we don’t have any ‘work’, these are our men who ‘work’.” By saying so, women may refer to “formal work,” yet, to me, they also sound like undermining their in-house responsibilities and “work”. I always wish women saying “we ‘work’, we are doing housework; instead of saying we don’t ‘work.’”
Finally, housework studies will help to: (a) value informal and reproductive work as much as formal and productive work, (b) reduce gendered oppression and gaps in families, (c) recognize and appreciate women’s roles within family dynamics, (d) challenge patriarchy and domineering structures and practices, (e) re-valuate the commonly believed homogeneous gendered identities, e.g, men (bread winners), and (f) promote and advance families’ social-economic wafer by reducing domestic violence and imposed subordinations on women.
I find this post particularly interesting because I had never thought about the idea of compensating women for their "labor" in the home until I took this class and I must say that it is a point worth serious discussion. First of all, I am in total agreement that women including my mother and my wife have made such immense contributions in my life that I would not know where to start if they ever demanded payment for their contributions in the home.
ReplyDeleteHowever in the interest of development discourse and hegemony and patriarchy and all the other sources of oppression, I would like to pose some questions for consideration. My first question is why would we want to compensate women with money when one of the key critiques of the modernization discourse was the fact that everything is measured in the context of GDP or other monetary terms? Is that the only reasonable means of compensation that we can think of or is it simply the most convenient?
The other question is a more practical one especially in the context of the so called "developing countries", and the question is how could such a compensation bill be paid for, or more specifically who would pay for it? I ask these questions not because I have answers but simply trying to look at the HOW all this could be done considering that this is a complete redefinition of work and compensation, but one that is just all the same.