The unpaid economy
Adam Smith, well renowned philosopher and economist, is often considered one of the founding fathers of modern economic thought. But who was there cooking his dinner? His mum!
Kate Raworth in her book ‘Doughnut Economics’[1] uses Adam Smith’s story as an example of the invisible work of women. Smith, never married and lived with his mother most of his life and while writing many of his best-known economic works. She brought him up and cared for him even during his adult life, maintaining their family home and cooking all his meals. Smith largely took this for granted. He never reflected on such a role within his publications, despite the fact that her unpaid labour sustained him and enabled him to do his work.
Such unpaid work is far too often invisible. This is not surprising given that today’s economic theory and practice is dominated by the belief that the mark of a thriving economy is endless financial growth.
Society places far less value on unpaid labour in comparison to paid work, which directly contributes to a country’s economic growth. Instead, unpaid labour tends to be treated as if it were a limitless natural resource and is seen as not adding any clear economic value.
However, you cannot separate unpaid labour from the wider economy. The care and domestic work that individuals engage in on a daily basis is central to upholding the well-being of individuals, families and societies. It ensures current and future generations are fed and nurtured so that they can participate in the workforce and it enables the vulnerable, differently abled and elderly to be cared for in a way that allows their continued involvement in their communities. In essence, the functioning of the economy depends on unpaid labour.
Attempts have been made to calculate the economic value of this labour to show how it contributes to the economy. In 2014 the ONS valued all the unpaid work done by those in the UK by estimating how much an individual would earn on average if they were to be paid for the unpaid tasks that they performed. This figure came to a whopping £1.01 trillion a year (the equivalent of 56% of the UKs GDP)![2]
Most of this labour is conducted by women. On average, women carry out 60% more unpaid work than men; dedicating around 26 hours of their week to it.[3] When it comes to cooking, childcare and housework, women take on more than double than their male counterparts.[4]
By the time women reach the age of 59 they have a 50% chance of providing care. Men do not reach this same likelihood until they are 75 years old[5]. As a result, it is not surprising that women are four times more likely to give up paid employment due to unpaid caring responsibilities[6].
Why does this matter?
Acknowledging and valuing the unpaid work that women do is an issue of justice and equality.
Feminist welfare state theory provides two distinct perspectives on unpaid care—the women’s employment perspective and women’s care perspective[7][8].
The women’s employment perspective sees strengthening women’s access to work as the cornerstone of gender equality, as it is essential to reducing women’s reliance on a male breadwinner. This involves ensuring women have access to employment opportunities and that the state provides adequate childcare and parental leave policies to help women maintain their ties to the labour market.
The women’s care perspective prioritises supporting women’s caring role, ensuring it is valued equally to paid employment by offering them remuneration for their time spent caring.
As Christians, both of these perspectives are important for us to consider.
Firstly, supporting women back into the labour market not only empowers women to have economic independence, but also gives women the freedom to pursue the other vocations and callings God has placed on their lives.
Secondly, the unpaid work of women contributes significantly to the functioning of the economy and the well-being of society as a whole and thus deserves to have greater value placed upon it. The Bible speaks about ensuring workers are rightly paid for the work that they do (Romans 4:4; 1 Timothy 5:18; Jeremiah 22:13). As such, ensuring the unpaid work of women is rewarded is a matter of justice for ‘the labourer deserves [her] wages’ (1 Timothy 5:18).
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Our social structures reflect where we as society place our value. Without including the unpaid work, which underpins our economy, in our measures of success, we dismiss the value of flourishing homes and communities and undermine the crucial role care work has in enabling love and worth to be shown to every individual.
This traditional economic thinking that focuses upon growth needs to be challenged. It needs to be challenged so that we can acknowledge and rightly value the vital contributions women make to the economy and the well-being and flourishing of society as a whole.
[1] Raworth, K., (2017). Doughnut economics: seven ways to think like a 21st-century economist. Chelsea Green Publishing.
[2] ONS. 2016. Women shoulder the responsibility of ‘unpaid work’ . [online]. Available at: Https://www.ons.gov.uk/employmentandlabourmarket/peopleinwork/earningsandworkinghours/articles/womenshouldertheresponsibilityofunpaidwork/2016-11-10
[3] ONS. 2016. Women shoulder the responsibility of ‘unpaid work’ . [online]. Available at: Https://www.ons.gov.uk/employmentandlabourmarket/peopleinwork/earningsandworkinghours/articles/womenshouldertheresponsibilityofunpaidwork/2016-11-10
[4]ONS. 2016. Women shoulder the responsibility of ‘unpaid work’ . [online]. Available at: Https://www.ons.gov.uk/employmentandlabourmarket/peopleinwork/earningsandworkinghours/articles/womenshouldertheresponsibilityofunpaidwork/2016-11-10
[5] https://www.fawcettsociety.org.uk/value-care-work
[6] https://www.fawcettsociety.org.uk/value-care-work
[7] Kilkey, M., & Bradshaw, J. (1999). Lone mothers, economic well-being, and policies. Gender and welfare state regimes, 147-184.
[8] Leira, A. (1992). Models of Motherhood: Welfare State Policy and Scandinavian Experiences of Everyday Practices. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press
