Part 2 - Women in (Recognized) Work
In this second lecture in the Institute for New Economic Thinking’s “Feminist Economics” series, Professor Jayati Ghosh explores the challenge of defining 'work', and the shortcomings and consequences of attempts to define it too narrowly.. Female labor often lies disproprortionately on the fluctuating frontiers of the formal economy. Women serve as reserve armies of labor for capitalist accumulation and frontline workers during industrialization. But as soon as these frontiers expand or change, women are expelled or relegated to the shadows of the informal economy and piece-rate labor. There is a frequent failure to recognize the importance of the kind of work many women engage in, which both keeps an economy running and enables its expansion and growth. By embracing narrow or outdated definitions of work, economists and government agencies overlook these vital frontier areas, and leave women workers, already the most vulnerable, without minimal protections.
