Resources on Care Economy

  1. International Women's Day 2022

    Princess Sarah Culberson: Invest in the care economy for a better gender equal world

    11 March 2022

    In celebrating International Women's Week, author, humanitarian and global public speaker, Princess Sarah Culberson of Sierra Leone, joins the ILO to call on countries to invest in the care economy and transformative policies to shape a better future and achieve the SDGs in 2030.

  2. ILO Working paper 55

    Costs and benefits of investing in transformative care policy packages: A macrosimulation study in 82 countries

    09 March 2022

  3. Working Paper No. 1 / 2017

    Cash transfer programmes, poverty reduction and women’s economic empowerment: Experience from Mexico

    23 August 2017

    This working paper on cash transfers in Mexico presents the impact of a major national cash transfer programme on health, education, income, poverty, labour force participation, time use and bargaining power of women at the household and community level. Its results point to evidence that most of these gender-related interventions have focused on breaking the inter-generational cycle of poverty, particularly for disadvantaged girl children, but have been weaker in promoting women’s economic empowerment through employment or sustainable livelihoods. It also highlights the challenge of enhancing women’s economic empowerment with targeted actions aimed at reducing women’s time poverty and redistributing unpaid care responsibilities between women and men and between families and the State. This working paper is a joint publication of the Gender, Equality and Diversity Branch in the ILO Conditions of Work and Equality Department and the ILO Social Protection Department.

  4. International Women’s Day 2015

    The motherhood pay gap: A review of the issues, theory and international evidence

    06 March 2015

    Evidence that mothers suffer a wage penalty over and above the penalty for being a woman raises concerns not only for gender equality but also for the capacity of societies to manage a sustainable balance between their economic aims of active female participation in paid work and the social aims of providing a fair distribution of income to support the reproduction and rearing of children. These concerns underpin ILO Conventions designed to combat inequality in women’s position in paid employment, especially associated with motherhood status.

  5. © Richard Lewisohn/Image Source 2022

    ILO study

    Maternity protection: Good for workers, good for small businesses

    20 October 2014

    Maternity protection and work-family measures can generate positive outcomes for small- and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs), says ILO Specialist Laura Addati.