[Spotlight] Care Work data to build an equitable economy
A Re-cap of ODC’s Implementation Working Group meeting on, July 26, 2022
by Wilfreda Edward-Dolcy, Flor Serale, Mercedes de los Santos, Natalia Carfi and cat cortes
July’s edition of the Open Data Charter Implementation Working Group raised issues to discuss how care work data can be used to build a more equitable economy. The month’s meeting featured three speakers who were all working to use data to highlight issues faced by women in the economy such as the unequal burden of care work. We publish this in time for International Equal Pay Day, to raise awareness for the pay gap discrimination that persists, not just in care work but in all areas of work.
Origins of care work
Like many English words, the word Economics is Greek in origin. It is based on the word oikonomía which means “management of a household, administration”. Home-economics and work done in the home, in some ways, is the original economics. Despite this, western economics often discounts work done in the home. In key measurements and studies of the economy, it has not been considered as real work at all. It was not until the beginning of the Feminist Economics movement in the 60s that women worked to include things like unpaid care work in traditional economic indicators such as Gross Domestic Product.
Data2X: The need for gender data to drive change
The first speaker was Neeraja Penumetcha, an Associate Director of Data2X. Her presentation focused on the power of gender data and how it can be used to support care work and drive policy change. She highlighted the power of gender data but also that there are gaps on how much of this data is readily available. Data2X worked on a project to measure how many hours women are spending doing unpaid care work.
The outcomes highlighted what many already know; women do more unpaid care work than men. That said, the results helped to provide deeper insights in understanding how care work has been a barrier to both women’s participation in paid work and their leisure time. The presentation also discussed how these data assets can drive policy change both directly, by providing targets, and indirectly, by building awareness. She also stressed the importance of effective dissemination strategies for data so it can be used by the public and civil society.
Center for Global Development: Childcare project trends report
The second speaker was Shelby Bourgault from the Centre for Global Development. She spoke on a project to create the type of data that Neeraja highlighted as important. The Center for Global Development analyzed 362 funding projects containing childcare components and were funded by eight of the world’s largest international development banks. The breakdown of this dataset provided many useful insights. For example, it showed that covid presented major funding challenges to these projects, with the total number of projects per year dipping in 2020. The future of this work will analyze the regional suitability of varying types of childcare projects.
City of Bogota’s Secretary of Women: Disaggregated Care Work Data
The final speaker was Andrea Ramírez, the Knowledge Management Director at the City of Bogota’s Secretary of Women. She presented on the results and findings of a baseline study on the District Care System of Bogota Bogota is the pioneer city in Latin America to have this system designed, and to recognise care work as an economic contributor. The city has been proactive in redistributing and reducing the burden of care work that falls mainly on women. The project used surveys and interviews to measure elements of care work within the City of Bogota such as time use, and public attitudes held about care work. The results were broken down by each of the city’s 20 districts. The process made use of what they called the three R’s: recognizing, redistributing, and reusing.
The results of the project highlighted the cyclical nature of the barriers faced by women and how there are both cultural and structural elements to these barriers. Culturally, there were views held by many survey respondents that included men being worse at care work or that a partner earning less money should be responsible for working in the home. Structural elements indicated that after care work, women have less time in a day to pursue other economic opportunities, self care , and leisure time.
Let’s care about data
All three speakers highlighted the importance of using data to first measure, then give voice to all people in the economy.
They stressed the need for effective dissemination strategies so that the public and advocacy groups can access and re-use data to the end of addressing issues of inequalities faced by women. Ultimately, data is a powerful tool and by sharing best practices through the Open Data Charter Implementation Working Group and other avenues, we can help to address the unfair burden of care work and make economics work for both men and women.
Learn more about the Open Data Charter’s work in pay equity and care work here.
If you would like to be a part of our Implementation Working Group, please don’t hesitate to get in touch: info@opendatacharter.org.
