SOCI2050 9th October 2020

Week 9: Unpaid work

What is work?

Background: In 1953, some rules of GDP were drawn up by western-educated men.

A boundary of production were set in drawing up these rules. They keened to measure
everything that involved in a market transaction. On one side of the boundary,
everything where there are a market exchanged is counted whether they are legal or
illegal (armaments, drugs, endangered species, trafficking people, etc). As long as
market is exchanged, it is all good for growth and it all counts. On the other side of
the boundary of production, it is the work done by them called “nonprimary”
producers was of little or no value (preparing food, tidying up kitchen, breastfeeding
infant, etc).

Can we say everything that is paid is work and everything that is not paid is not
work and has no value?

These used to be a point of views before, but they are definitely wrong nowadays.

Feminism:

 Not everything that is not paid is not work and have no value!
 We cannot consider all the labour that goes into the production of life such as
cooking, cleaning, and even the labour of giving birth to the child as activities
of nature and are only noticed when they are absent.

All the unpaid work can be measured in time-use survey rather than money.

Statistics about unpaid work

 SOCI2050 9th October 2020
“When you combine hours of worked in employment, housework, and childcare,
men come off looking like a bunch of lazy, couch-lying, TV-watching sloths”
(Greg Jericho).

Women are not paid what they are busy doing. There are few women who end
their working lives having earned the same as, or more than, men working in similar
employment.

Volunteering as a form of unpaid work

Volunteering takes place in three forms of organisations.

For-profit organisations

 In the market, this kind of organisations make profits, share price, and pursue
self-interest by following market logics (shareholder activism).
 Engaging unpaid workers makes for-profit companies to create more profits.
However, they can use these profits to benefit shareholders and have no
obligation to do more with less.
 Hence traditional for-profit commercial companies are not intended to benefit
from free labour or coerce individuals into free labour arrangements with
reference to it being ‘volunteering’. Volunteering is not encouraged in the for-
profit organisations.

Non-profit organisations

 Are not motivated by profits and not able to accrue profits for distribution.
 SOCI2050 9th October 2020

 This kind of organisations draw on social welfare logics (reinvesting in the

social mission, etc.) and community logics which are associated with trust,
reciprocity, and community values.
 Engaging unpaid workers make business but also moral sense.
 With unpaid workers, organisations are able to do more with less: reach more
people, deliver more meals, counsel more people, prevent more suicides
through helplines, etc.

Hybrid originations (e.g. social enterprise)

 This kind of organisations combine both market and social logics and have
aspects of both charity and business at their core, which are driven by social
and economic motives.
 Hybrid will also try to make use of volunteering labour because of profits,
legitimacy, and acceptance.

Close link between paid and unpaid work

Most people do volunteer work are not mainly because they want to give back to
community. In fact, many people explain a link between their volunteer work
and previous paid work. For example, the women below have no opportunity to
keep working in a pay capacity after retiring, so she continue to choose to do
volunteer work as a nurse. Most people may choose volunteer work because paid
work is not available to them (paid opportunities are no longer possible).
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Internships – a mechanism for overcoming or creating inequality?

A work experience arrangement or internship is when a person works for a

business to gain experience in a particular occupation or industry. These
arrangements can be a valuable way for prospective employees to make the
transition from study to work or explore a new career path. Sometimes these
arrangements span several months and can lead to ongoing employment.

An unpaid work experience arrangement or unpaid internship can be lawful if it is a

vocational placement or if there is no employment relationship found to exist. In
particular:

 the person must not be doing “productive” work.

 the main benefit of the arrangement should be to the person doing the
placement.

 it must be clear that the person is receiving a meaningful learning experience,

training or skill development. 

If one or more points above are met, people should be paid. If unpaid, it is
unlawful.
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Unpaid work is predominantly to be understood in relation to the trajectories of
people’s paid work and people’s access to work.