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allocation of tasks between women and men (and girls and boys) also constitute the gender division of
labor, which is seen as variable over time and space and constantly under negotiation.
Some differences in gendered division of labor:
• Gender division of paid and unpaid work in private and public life
• Occupational segregation by gender and race/ethnicity
• Cultural variation in the gender division of labor
• Changes in the distribution of human capital (education) and its effect on the gender division
of labor
• Gender dimensions of informal employment and small businesses
• Gender dimensions of labor migration
• The relationship between gender ideology and the division of labor throughout the life cycle.
Different societies and cultures assign different roles and responsibilities to men and women.
However, in the developed nations, today the boundary between these perceived roles and
responsibilities for men and women is becoming thinner and faint. But, in not so developed and
developing nations, men have more visible and recognized roles because of their association with
productive and paid work than women who are engaged more in invisible work and therefore, not
economically accounted for. Men’s roles are located in public sphere whereas women’s roles relegate
them to the private space of household. However, household is the center of the production of human
resources. It is within the household that human resources are primarily reproduced and maintained.
By and large, human beings are ‘privately’ produced within the household. Further, the women play
an important role in production.
Due to biological reasons, the onus of reproduction lies with the woman. And, due to a sexual division
of household labor along gender lines, the maintenance of human resources also becomes their prime
responsibility. Women work and they have always worked. However, the larger and common
understanding of work which relates it to the labor market and to remuneration, excludes both
women and their contribution to society. It is the conceptualization of what constitutes ‘work’ that
determines the value and worth attributed to women. Issues related to women’s work relate to
women’s activities both within and outside the household. However, several issues originate from
structures that are set within households. Hence, it becomes imminent to begin with analysis of
women’s role in the household that closely shapes the discrimination they face in the labor market at
home.
The ideology of patriarchy, determines a sexual division of labor which assigns to women the prime
responsibility of care of all the members of the household – men, children, the aged and the ill. In an
extended family hierarchy allocates a different status to each member and the work-burden is
determined accordingly. There is also a hierarchical placing among women of extended families. This
placing operates at levels different from those that are found in the world of only men and those of all
the members, men and women together. The extent to which women’s work will extend to
geographical locations outside the household is determined by caste, class, ethnicity, age and religion.
Types of work done by women: Women have always contributed to a nation’s social-economic
development, both in direct manner by taking up work outside of home and indirectly by facilitating
supply of labor and its maintenance. But, both in developed and developing nations, women are laden
with cumulative inequalities that result from discriminatory cultural and socio-economic practices
that regulate the status of women in society. The chores and activities that women generally carry out
do not fetch any income to the family. These tasks, perceived as their natural roles, are related to their
reproductive and community resource management roles which are not economically productive,
thus, not recognized and valued. In many societies women also carry out productive work but are not
paid for it remain confined to family activities. Therefore, women’s contributions to national
economies do not qualify for accounting, making it invisible.
Work performed by women can be placed under the following categories;
• Productive/unproductive work
• Visible/invisible work
• Paid/unpaid work
• Economically/socially productive work Unpaid work can be defined as work that does not
receive any direct remuneration. It can be of two categories:
• Unpaid work falling within the production boundary of UN System of National Accounting
(SNA). That is to say, unpaid work that is covered under the purview of national income
accounts. It is also referred to as unpaid SNA work’ which includes subsistence production,
work performed by unpaid family workers employed in family enterprise and work such as
collection of fuel and fodder.