HNRS 230 Lecture Notes - Lecture 7: Wage Labour

• School: George Mason University
• Department: Honors Program in General Education
• Course: HNRS 230
• Professor: Jatia Wrighten

Document Summary

In the us, women spend more of their productive work hours in unpaid labor than in paid labor. Estimated economic value ranges from the equivalent of 24-60% of the us gdp. Courts and other legal actors repeatedly decline opportunities to treat housework as work because of the affectionate familial context in which the work is performed. This is what you signed up for, you should enjoy it. Denying housework its status as work is costly to those who perform it. Sacrifice of time that is not valued; maintains power structure in relationship. The legal treatment of housework in one context can set norms that cut across a number of legal disciplines. If we classify housework as actual work, it will affect other social norms author"s argument. Across a variety of fields, legal actors tie housework to the affections that characterize the home and not to the wage labor that brings material well-being to a family wage gap and housework.