How to make care work visible? The case of dependence policies in France

Own Gender, Sibling’s Gender, Parent’s Gender

“…The similarity of results across different measures of care might reflect the type of assistance the HRS captures. In particular, the HRS captures hands-on physical care (help with ADLs) and help with other chores (help with IADLs), which women are more likely to provide, and leaves out forms of assistance that men are more likely to provide to elderly parents, such as yard work or help with home maintenance (Schneider 2012; Trabut and Weber 2009). Finally, the study’s findings are robust to alternative coding of the explanatory variables and the inclusion of other possible confounding variables.…”

“…As a result, relegating elder assistance to families has potentially intensifying effects on gender inequality (Sarkisian and Gerstel 2004). It is worth noting, however, that the experiences of Scandinavian countries, where entitlements to public support are more generous than in North America, and France, where the state subsidizes either family members or paid professionals for home-based elder caregiving, suggest that women might continue to dominate informal elder care even in the presence of alternatives (Borchorst and Siim 2002; Trabut and Weber 2009). This points to the importance of socially and culturally constructed norms about gender and elder care, in addition to availability of practical alternatives and material resources (Hook 2006; Trabut and Weber 2009).…”

“…As a result, the HRS may underestimate time spent on help with IADLs, because assistance with the IADLs reported in the HRS is not necessarily directly observable by the respondents (Folbre 2012). To the extent that men are more likely to help with administrative tasks included in IADLs (Trabut and Weber 2009), the HRS may underestimate sons’ caregiving efforts. Second, the HRS does not capture time spent on activities supplementary to primary elder care, such as cleaning, doing laundry, or organizing the household (Friedman and Seltzer 2010).…”

14. L'aide aux personnes âgées n'est-elle qu'une affaire de femmes ?

“…Elles s'investissent aussi plus intensément : d'après l'enquête européenne SHARE 4 , par exemple, si l'on considère les personnes de 50 à 65 ans qui apportent de l'aide à un parent dépendant sans pour autant cohabiter avec lui, les filles représentent à peine plus de la moitié des enfants qui apportent moins d'une heure par semaine, mais elles représentent 65 % de ceux qui apportent entre une et deux heures et 75 % de ceux qui apportent plus de deux heures (Fontaine, 2009). Enfin, elles s'impliquent différemment : une enquête exploratoire, qui envisageait une palette particulièrement large d'activités d'aide, montrait ainsi que les fils s'investissaient proportionnellement plus que les filles dans des tâches parfois lourdes, mais ponctuelles, irrégulières, comme accompagner chez le spécialiste ou réaménager la salle de bain par exemple ; des tâches au total moins prenantes, mais aussi plus difficile à repérer dans les enquêtes (Trabut et Weber, 2009 ;Pennec, 2009). Plusieurs effets se conjuguent pour expliquer ces différences de comportement entre hommes et femmes 1. l'effet de la configuration familiale.…”

Subordination in Home Service Jobs

“…But the employment of Filipino domestic servants in the wealthier neighborhoods west of Paris (Mozère 2005), or of nannies from the Côte d’Ivoire in Paris (Ibos 2012), is a statistically rare situation: More than 80 percent of paid domestic workers work outside the Paris metropolitan area, and over two-thirds in cities and towns of fewer than 200,000 inhabitants. Because of the political context (Joël and Martin 1998; Ledoux 2011; Trabut and Weber 2009) found in many other countries in the Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) (Jenson 1997; Lewis 1992), the workers discussed in this article do not share the same traits as those working in domestic servant positions. The relatively low income disparity in France and policies favoring public assistance for domestic tasks (Orloff 1993) have led to the development of jobs that are relatively closely regulated by social services, like the aides for the elderly studied by Cinzia Solari (2006) in San Francisco.…”