Scribd Logo
Upload

Welcome to Scribd!

  • 19 views

    Npaid ARE ORK: in Times of The Crisis

    Uploaded by

    Tuta Firma Cordis
    This document discusses the impacts of the COVID-19 pandemic on unpaid care work, which is disproportionately performed by women. It notes that unpaid care work accounts for 40% of global GDP and that women on average dedicate 3.2 times more hours to it than men. During the pandemic, women have spent significantly more time caring for children as schools closed. However, some countries have seen fathers increase their participation in unpaid domestic tasks as employment changed. The document recommends strengthening national care systems and supportive labor policies to promote a more gender-equal sharing of unpaid care responsibilities.

    Copyright:

    © All Rights Reserved
    Download as PDF, TXT or read online from Scribd

    Npaid ARE ORK: in Times of The Crisis

    Uploaded by

    Tuta Firma Cordis
    19 views15 pages
    This document discusses the impacts of the COVID-19 pandemic on unpaid care work, which is disproportionately performed by women. It notes that unpaid care work accounts for 40% of global GDP and that women on average dedicate 3.2 times more hours to it than men. During the pandemic, women have spent significantly more time caring for children as schools closed. However, some countries have seen fathers increase their participation in unpaid domestic tasks as employment changed. The document recommends strengthening national care systems and supportive labor policies to promote a more gender-equal sharing of unpaid care responsibilities.

    Original Title

    Unpaid-care-work-in-times-of-the-COVID-19-crisis.Duragova

    Copyright

    © © All Rights Reserved

    Available Formats

    PDF, TXT or read online from Scribd

    Did you find this document useful?

    Is this content inappropriate?

    This document discusses the impacts of the COVID-19 pandemic on unpaid care work, which is disproportionately performed by women. It notes that unpaid care work accounts for 40% of global GDP and that women on average dedicate 3.2 times more hours to it than men. During the pandemic, women have spent significantly more time caring for children as schools closed. However, some countries have seen fathers increase their participation in unpaid domestic tasks as employment changed. The document recommends strengthening national care systems and supportive labor policies to promote a more gender-equal sharing of unpaid care responsibilities.

    Copyright:

    © All Rights Reserved
    Download as PDF, TXT or read online from Scribd
    Download as pdf or txt
    19 views15 pages

    Npaid ARE ORK: in Times of The Crisis

    Uploaded by

    Tuta Firma Cordis
    This document discusses the impacts of the COVID-19 pandemic on unpaid care work, which is disproportionately performed by women. It notes that unpaid care work accounts for 40% of global GDP and that women on average dedicate 3.2 times more hours to it than men. During the pandemic, women have spent significantly more time caring for children as schools closed. However, some countries have seen fathers increase their participation in unpaid domestic tasks as employment changed. The document recommends strengthening national care systems and supportive labor policies to promote a more gender-equal sharing of unpaid care responsibilities.

    Copyright:

    © All Rights Reserved
    Download as PDF, TXT or read online from Scribd
    Download as pdf or txt
    of 15

    UNPAID CARE WORK

    IN TIMES OF THE COVID-19 CRISIS

    UN Expert Group Meeting


    “Families in development: Assessing progress, challenges and emerging
    issues. Focus on modalities for IYF + 30 and parenting education”

    Dr Esuna Dugarova
    Gender Specialist, UNDP

    New York, 18 June 2020


    Health: nearly 7 million cases, over 400,000 deaths
    COVID-19 globally - largest gender gaps among those aged 60-74

    Multidimensional Economy: 305 million jobs globally to be lost, including in


    informal sector with women 90% in South Asia and SSA
    Crisis
    Education: schools closed in over 190 countries, affecting
    1.6 billion students, with impacts on gender digital divide

    Food: 265 million facing acute food insecurity – women


    and girls play a key role in the food system

    Poverty: over 160 million people to fall in extreme poverty


    by 2030
    COVID-19 cases
    by age and gender

    Reduced provision of care


    provided by older women
    Source: UN Women
    Gendered impacts of COVID-19

    Economic sectors with Women healthcare


    large share of female workers on frontline of
    employment COVID-19 response

    Food/accommodation 96 million or 70.4% of


    suffer from full closures – total workforce in
    144 million workers health/social work
    with over half women sectors are women
    Share of women among all workers in health and social work, 2020

    Source: ILO
    Unpaid care work
    Economic value of unpaid care work accounts for 40% of GDP.

    Women dedicate on average 3.2 times more hours to unpaid care work than men.

    Grandmothers spend over 5 hours on a daily basis.

    No country achieved equal share of unpaid care work.

    Progress in reducing the unpaid care gap has been slow.

    Men are more involved in unpaid work than ever (mainly in household activities
    e.g. shopping, house repairs).
    Global trend in time spent in unpaid care work in
    25 countries, 1998-2012

    Over 15-year timespan:

    • women’s unpaid care


    work decreased by 10
    minutes

    • men’s unpaid care work


    increased by 13 minutes

    • women spend more


    time on unpaid care
    work than men.
    Charmes (2019)
    Average hours per day spent on unpaid care work,
    by gender and race/ethnicity, USA, 2018

    Intersectionality:

    In USA, women in
    Hispanic and Asian
    couples spend more time
    on unpaid care work.

    Hess et al. (2020)


     Re-traditionalization of care

    • In USA, UK and Germany during the lockdown, women spend


    COVID-19 significantly more time caring for children (Adams-Prassl et al.
    impacts on 2020).

    unpaid care • Homeschooling – a new domestic task for many families.


    work: Mother’s responsibility – create educational content for children
    (Carlson et al. 2020).

    negative • Working mothers spend less time on paid work but more on
    household work. Even when working mothers earn more, they
    do more childcare than working fathers (Andrew et al. 2020).
     More egalitarian care arrangements

    • In USA, share of families with equal sharing of unpaid work


    increased – due to fathers spending more time on domestic work
    COVID-19 (Carlson et al. 2020).
    impacts on
    • In Spain, men increased their participation in household tasks e.g.
    unpaid care grocery shopping (González and Farré 2020).
    work:
    • In UK, gender childcare gap narrowed from 30.5 to 27.2% – due to
    men’s availability to participate in childcare (Sevilla & Smith 2020).
    positive
    • Fathers doubled their time on childcare when they lost their job in
    UK (Andrew et al. 2020).

    • In Germany, fathers with higher earnings working from home


    provide more care support (Möhring et al. 2020).
    Key factors in redistribution of unpaid care work
    i. employment status of parents: whether or not mother and father are
    in paid work
    ii. parents’ working conditions: whether parents have flexible work
    arrangements and whether father can work from home
    iii. type of job performed by mother: whether it is essential services

     Fathers who work from home or lost their job have more availability
    for unpaid care work.
     Mothers continue to do more unpaid care and domestic work
    regardless of employment and working conditions.
    (i) Parental leave: supporting working parents’ care work during
    school/childcare closure
    • Norway – childcare leave doubled to 20 care days; USA – 12 weeks of paid
    family leave; Ireland – flexible work for public sector employees

    Care policy (ii) Care services: care support for essential service workers
    • Austria, France, Netherlands – childcare facilities for essential workers;
    responses to Australia – childcare fee relief for families; Iran – new nursing homes

    COVID-19 (iii) Financial support: income support to parents


    • Italy – €600 to cover babysitting; Cuba – childcare benefit at 100% of
    basic salary; Japan – subsidies to firms with paid-leave systems

    (iv) Utility support: free/subsidized household utility bills


    • Colombia – water services free of charge for low-income families; India –
    free cooking gas to women in rural areas.
    Unprecedented impacts on unpaid care work

    1 2 3 4
    Increased unpaid Grandmothers Impact on women’s Potential positive
    care work reinforces provide less care, workforce, labour shift to more
    existing gender relying on family or productivity, egalitarian share of
    inequality. social workers. economy. unpaid care work.
    Policy recommendations

    National care systems Labour market policies


    • enhance support to working parents • support (re-)integration of unpaid
    through paid leave carers into the labour force
    • universal provision of quality care • offer flexible work arrangements with
    services option of home-based work
    • expand family/child benefits • improve workplace hours to allow
    • increase investments in social and more time for self-care
    physical infrastructure

    Supported by macroeconomic environment with adequate fiscal and monetary


    policies to fund care and labour market policies
    Thank you!
    For questions and comments:
    [email protected]

    @Esuna_Dugarova

    You might also like