Accounting for Unpaid Care Work in India-2019

Aparna Roy, International Institute for Population Sciences (IIPS)
T.V. Sekher, IIPS

The Indian System of National Accounts (SNA), like other countries, does not include the value of home-produced services in the national accounts production boundary. This article estimates this ‘unpaid care work’ (household services unaccounted for in SNA) produced by individuals at each age in time units and computes the economic value of it using the Time Use Survey 2019, Periodic Labour Force Survey 2019-20, and the methodology developed by Gretchen Donehower. Results show that men specialize in paid work and women in unpaid care work. There is gender variation in the production age profiles of unpaid care work. The total time spent on indirect care is more than direct care for all ages. The hours spent on direct care are higher for women than men, and no gender gap is observed in the consumption of unpaid care work. Estimates of net time transfers show that women are net givers of unpaid care work, and men are net beneficiaries. Age profiles of various activities in monetary terms take up similar shapes of curves as time age profiles. This is the first step to initiating focused and inclusive interventions to acknowledge that invisible economy and the individuals involved in it.

Keywords: Economic Demography, Families, Unions and Households, Gender Dynamics

See extended abstract.