All work and no pay
The one and only Time Use Survey done in India in 1999 clearly showed the double yoke of drudgery women carry. A decade has passed, but there wouldn’t have been much change. On average, women spent 5.5 hours daily on unpaid care work in rural areas, compared to 1.2 hours by men. In urban areas, women spent even more time — 6.1 hours — on such work while men spent just 1.1 hours.
This unpaid ‘care work’ women specifically do includes everything from cooking to looking after children, cleaning the house, fetching essentials (including water and fuel), washing clothes, etc. Looking after the sick and elderly is also included. Inarguably, this is life’s essential work. But somehow, it has become invisible, uncounted in any economist’s calculation, unrecognised in labour surveys.
It is sometimes argued that if women are not gainfully employed, what is wrong in their doing domestic work while men earn outside? Sounds fair, except the Time Use Survey showed starkly that in practice, women do both — outside work for supplementing family incomes and all the domestic work. In rural areas, employed women spent 4.9 hours doing unpaid care work while unemployed women put 6 hours in it. In urban areas, employed women did unpaid care work for 4.9 hours daily while the unemployed ones (“housewives”) slogged for 6.3 hours. Interestingly, there was no difference in men’s contribution to domestic work, whether they or their wives were employed or not.
Another important aspect of housewives’ life is revealed by an analysis of unpaid productive work done by women inside families. N Neetha and Indrani Mazumdar of the Centre for Women’s Development Studies (CWDS) broke down the data from National Sample Survey Organisation (NSSO) surveys to show that unpaid work by women categorised as ‘self-employed’ was rising. There are three types of self-employed people — own account workers (like someone who makes toys and sells them);
employers (working with hired workers); and unpaid family workers, helping in a family business (like pottery or vegetable-selling).
Women’s share in the first two categories, own account and owners, declined from 27 per cent to 23 per cent in rural areas between 1993 and 2005. But women’s share in unpaid family work increased from 73 per cent to 77 per cent in rural areas, declining marginally from 46 per cent to 45 per cent in urban areas. In other words, over three fourths of “housewives” in rural areas and nearly half in urban areas are doing unpaid productive work to supplement the family’s income. This is in addition to the domestic and care work described above.
With this kind of harsh labour in store for women every day of their lives, there is hardly any time left for education or leisure. As surveys repeatedly show, girls drop out of school to do domestic work at home before going to their marital home and doing more of the same. This life of unsung and uncounted drudgery by Indian women is further weighed down by domestic oppression, even violence. Over one-third of women suffer from violence from their husbands and in-laws, according to the third National Family & Health Survey in 2005-06. One of the primary causes — dowry demands by the marital home. Athough this represents the tip of the iceberg, reported cases of ‘cruelty by husband and relatives’ as the Indian Penal Code puts it, have seen a relentless increase from 43,823 in 1999 to 89,546 in 2009, according to the National Crime Records Bureau (NCRB). Dowry-related violence, leading to the killing of young brides, also continues unabated, rising from 6,699 in 1999 to 8,383 in 2009.
Small wonder that faced with this bleak, unforgiving life, over 55 per cent of all women who committed suicide in 2009 were housewives. This proportion is up from about 52 per cent a decade ago.
The one and only Time Use Survey done in India in 1999 clearly showed the double yoke of drudgery women carry. A decade has passed, but there wouldn’t have been much change. On average, women spent 5.5 hours daily on unpaid care work in rural areas, compared to 1.2 hours by men. In urban areas, women spent even more time — 6.1 hours — on such work while men spent just 1.1 hours.
This unpaid ‘care work’ women specifically do includes everything from cooking to looking after children, cleaning the house, fetching essentials (including water and fuel), washing clothes, etc. Looking after the sick and elderly is also included. Inarguably, this is life’s essential work. But somehow, it has become invisible, uncounted in any economist’s calculation, unrecognised in labour surveys.
It is sometimes argued that if women are not gainfully employed, what is wrong in their doing domestic work while men earn outside? Sounds fair, except the Time Use Survey showed starkly that in practice, women do both — outside work for supplementing family incomes and all the domestic work. In rural areas, employed women spent 4.9 hours doing unpaid care work while unemployed women put 6 hours in it. In urban areas, employed women did unpaid care work for 4.9 hours daily while the unemployed ones (“housewives”) slogged for 6.3 hours. Interestingly, there was no difference in men’s contribution to domestic work, whether they or their wives were employed or not.
Another important aspect of housewives’ life is revealed by an analysis of unpaid productive work done by women inside families. N Neetha and Indrani Mazumdar of the Centre for Women’s Development Studies (CWDS) broke down the data from National Sample Survey Organisation (NSSO) surveys to show that unpaid work by women categorised as ‘self-employed’ was rising. There are three types of self-employed people — own account workers (like someone who makes toys and sells them);
employers (working with hired workers); and unpaid family workers, helping in a family business (like pottery or vegetable-selling).
Women’s share in the first two categories, own account and owners, declined from 27 per cent to 23 per cent in rural areas between 1993 and 2005. But women’s share in unpaid family work increased from 73 per cent to 77 per cent in rural areas, declining marginally from 46 per cent to 45 per cent in urban areas. In other words, over three fourths of “housewives” in rural areas and nearly half in urban areas are doing unpaid productive work to supplement the family’s income. This is in addition to the domestic and care work described above.
With this kind of harsh labour in store for women every day of their lives, there is hardly any time left for education or leisure. As surveys repeatedly show, girls drop out of school to do domestic work at home before going to their marital home and doing more of the same. This life of unsung and uncounted drudgery by Indian women is further weighed down by domestic oppression, even violence. Over one-third of women suffer from violence from their husbands and in-laws, according to the third National Family & Health Survey in 2005-06. One of the primary causes — dowry demands by the marital home. Athough this represents the tip of the iceberg, reported cases of ‘cruelty by husband and relatives’ as the Indian Penal Code puts it, have seen a relentless increase from 43,823 in 1999 to 89,546 in 2009, according to the National Crime Records Bureau (NCRB). Dowry-related violence, leading to the killing of young brides, also continues unabated, rising from 6,699 in 1999 to 8,383 in 2009.
Small wonder that faced with this bleak, unforgiving life, over 55 per cent of all women who committed suicide in 2009 were housewives. This proportion is up from about 52 per cent a decade ago.
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