Why we should care about the ‘care economy’
‘Markets cannot operate without a workforce, which is supplied by social reproduction in the home. That social reproduction is comprised of the unpaid work that makes paid work possible.’
THE I NTERNATIONAL Monetary Fund’s (IMF) first female managing director, Christine Lagarde, since assuming the role, has used her office to bring the issue of gender to the forefront of policy prescriptions for economic growth. Her proposal of “the economic case for gender equity ” focuses primarily on the barriers to women’s f ull par ticipation i n the economy, and rests on the proven basis that women’s economic empowerment leads to economic growth, reduces inequality, boosts productivity, and furthers economic diversification. These barriers take different forms from one country to another. In some countries, there are cultural impediments to women working outside the home; in others, l egal barriers to women’s financial inclusion; and, still in others, logistical obstacles, such as inadequate transportation. Of all the obstructions to women’s participation in the labour market, the principal obstacle throughout the world is the unpaid work that women do at home and in the community. This unpaid work – the labour required to meet the needs of children, the ill, the elderly and the disabled to be provided and cared for, and to reproduce the labour force – is what is called the ‘care economy ’. Markets cannot operate without a workforce, which is supplied by social reproduction in the home. That social reproduction is comprised of the unpaid work that makes paid work possible.
These are not new ideas. Women’s rights activists and feminist academics have been advancing these arguments since the 1970s. The care economy is only considered new now because it occupies a place on the mainstream policy agenda. The reality is that if the IMF says that gender matters, then, it does. The 2017 US$12-billion loan programme with Egypt contained gender stipulations, including allocating US$13 million to improve the availability of public nurseries to increase female labour force participation.
Indeed, the IMF mission chief for Jamaica has held consultations with Jamaican stakeholders towards the consideration of gender issues in the reform agenda for Jamaica’s current IMF programme, and just two weeks ago, convened a seminar that included a presentation on crime, youth and the economy that contained a significant gender dimension in its analysis.