Stockholm Papers in Economic History
Department of Economic History, Stockholm University
No 4:
Economic growth, gendered division of labour and unpaid domestic services in historical perspective
Rodney Edvinsson ()
Abstract: This paper discusses the issue of including unpaid
domestic services in Swedish historical national accounts. The paper
analyses the period 1964-2000, based on the time use studies for 1964 and
2000/2001. During this period, in Sweden, the proportion between hours
worked in unpaid domestic services and paid work, respectively, did not
change to any substantial degree. However, a fundamental change in the
gendered division of labour took place. Men substantially increased their
share in unpaid domestic services and women substantially increased their
share in paid worked. The inclusion of unpaid domestic services in
historical national accounts changes our perception of long-term economic
growth and structural change. For example, the increase in the relative
size of services during the second half of the 20th century can largely be
explained by the increasing rate of participation of women in the labour
market. The paper finds that Swedish economic growth in the post-war period
would most likely be lowered if unpaid domestic services would be included
in GDP, but probably not more than by 0.1-0.3 percentage points per
year.
Keywords: GDP; economic growth; feminist economics; gender; Sweden; (follow links to similar papers)
JEL-Codes: B54; N14; (follow links to similar papers)
22 pages, March 1, 2009
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- This paper is published as:
-
Edvinsson, Rodney, (2009), 'Ekonomisk tillväxt, genusarbetsdelning och obetalt hemarbete i historisk belysning', Historisk Tidskrift, Vol. 129, No. 1, pages 5-26
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