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conceptual guide to the unpaid work module

Prepared by Abetha Mahalingam, Nancy Zukewich, and Krista Scott-Dixon

demonstration: the value of occupational equivalents

The "applying key concepts" section of this module examined competing approaches to assigning value to unpaid work. One such approach was the occupational equivalency, or replacement cost, approach, which calculates the wage that a person might earn doing a particular job that is equivalent to an unpaid work task. There are, of course, limitations to this approach. First, there is considerable variation within occupational equivalence categories, highlighting the shortcomings of using this form of assigning value. Second, there are divisions of labour and there is stratification of earnings within and among occupations that appear to be similar. These divisions of labour are based on gender and social relations such as immigrant status. As a result, assigning a monetary value to particular tasks is riddled with complexities. Examining the occupational heterogeneity of domestic tasks also points to the role of social relations in shaping the value and status accorded to these occupations.

As the first part of this guide indicates, unpaid work is often undervalued, and hence the activities constituting unpaid work tend to be assigned relatively low exchange values. As a result, even when performed for pay, most of these tasks are poorly compensated, frequently performed by workers belonging to marginalized groups, and they are often characterized by relatively low levels of recognized skill. However, there is sufficient diversity among occupational categories to examine how these jobs are gendered, and what this implies for the application of occupational equivalences in the valuation of unpaid work.

Drawing on the statistical tables in in the GWD, this demonstration considers four key elements in exploring the implications of occupational equivalency:

One of the tables in the unpaid work section of the GWD, (table catalogue number UPW CNS B-1), provides a detailed list of the types of occupations associated with unpaid domestic work. Since a large number of occupations are included in this table, it is useful to begin this demonstration by looking at groupings of occupations rather than individual occupations. The table below shows the eight main occupational groups that correspond to unpaid domestic tasks.

By downloading the Beyond 20/20 data and producing a chart, we can see the gender composition in the form of a bar chart.

From this chart, it is evident that women (represented by the green bar) are well represented in occupational groups that represent various types of domestic work: care-giving, clothing care, and food preparation/cleanup. Men (represented by the purple bar) are more likely to be in transport occupations, and occupations related to grounds maintenance. Men also make up the majority of workers in cleaning occupations.

At first glance, using the subset of cleaning occupations to assess the value of cleaning tasks would appear to be straightforward. However, using aggregate categories can be misleading, as many occupations and tasks are collected into these categories. Closer examination of the subset of cleaning occupations in the 2001 Census demonstrates the heterogeneity within broad occupational groupings (numbers before the occupation name are the NOC-S 2001 codes [link to NOC-S]). Breaking down this occupational group reveals gendered divisions of cleaning labour by occupation, and illustrates that women are in fact the majority in one key category; namely, light duty cleaners. The table below compares the gender composition of two types of cleaners, light duty cleaners and janitors, caretakers, and building superintendents.

As noted, women represent a majority of light duty cleaners. Light duty cleaners perform general daily cleaning in private businesses, institutions such as hospitals, and private residences. Conversely, the majority of janitors, caretakers, and building superintendents are men. Their role is to clean and maintain the interior and exterior of commercial, institutional, and residential buildings as well as grounds-keeping. Building superintendents tend to be responsible for the operation of large establishments such as office or residential buildings, and they may also have supervisory responsibilities.

Light duty cleaning occupations are highly feminized: the are characterized by low levels of recognized skill, supervisory responsibility, and the usage of specialized equipment (Messing 1998; Messing, Doniol-Shaw and Haentjens, 1993). Predictable earnings differences not only between these two occupational groups of cleaners (as shown in the table above) but between men and women within groups attest to these claims. While compensation for both men and women in cleaning occupations is poor, women earn still less than men in both occupations, despite the fact that they constitute the majority of light duty cleaners. The table below shows the gender pay gap in annual earnings within each group.

Not only do men and women tend to work in different cleaning occupations, their average annual earnings differ considerably. Moreover, even when women comprise a majority of the workers in an occupation (e.g., light duty cleaners), their wages are still lower on average than men's.

These data show that light duty cleaning occupations tend to be female-dominated occupations with relatively lower wages compared to janitorial occupations, confirming the insights of literature on gender and paid domestic work [link to sources…]. They also highlight the gender gap in earnings between men and women in this occupational group. But what other social relations, in addition to gender relations, shape, and are shaped by, the low levels of recognized skill and the low pay characterizing these occupations? To explore this question, the unpaid work module allows researchers to consider the relationship between gender, immigrant status, "visible minority" status, and occupations, such as light duty cleaning.

Research on cleaning occupations (Cranford 1998; Messing 1998) indicates that immigrant status and "visible minority" status also shape, and are shaped by, the low level of pay and recognized skill in cleaning work. Thus, not only are there divisions between men and women, there are also divisions among women. This "layering" of occupational differentiation and stratification further highlights the complexities arising from using an occupational equivalency analysis that seeks to place a value on domestic tasks.

To explore this complexity further, the table below considers divisions among women workers by dividing them into four mutually exclusive categories by immigrant and "visible minority" status:

The table then compares these groups in terms of their representation in the labour force as a whole, and in light duty cleaning occupations.

This table illustrates that non-immigrant, non-visible minority women, i.e. Canadian-born white women, constitute 78% of women in the Canadian labour force as a whole, but just under 72% of light duty cleaners are from this group. In contrast, both categories of immigrant women make up higher percentages of light duty cleaners when compared to their participation in labour force as a whole. Immigrant visible minority women represent about 10% of women in the labour force overall, but nearly 15% of light duty cleaners, while immigrant non-visible minority women constitute about 9% of the labour force, but nearly 13% of light duty cleaners. Thus, white Canadian-born women are under-represented as in this occupational group, while immigrant women are over-represented.

This demonstration has highlighted some challenges in accurately measuring unpaid work using occupational equivalency criteria. First, women, and immigrant women in particular, are over-represented in one type of cleaning occupation with a particularly low level of recognized skill; second, within both types of cleaning occupations discussed, there is a significant gap in annual earnings between men and women. These findings raise the question: on what basis can cleaning tasks be evaluated? To what degree is the monetary value of these tasks shaped by the gender, immigrant status, and 'race'-ethnicity of the worker who is likely to perform them? Correspondingly, what role do social relations play in shaping the demographics of the paid cleaning workforce?

Although assigning an economic value to particular tasks based on equivalent occupations may appear straightforward, this demonstration suggests that occupational heterogeneity within broad categories of domestic-type tasks, as well as intersections between gender and other social relations, makes the task highly complex. The GWD library contains citations for sources that point to divisions of labour among occupational groups, to foster further analysis.

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