Unpaid work: The work we rarely count

Assalamu alaikum wa Rahmatullahi wa Barakatuh.

- AMENAH F. PANGANDAMAN

Last week, I was scrolling through the news online when an article caught my attention - the Social Weather Stations' survey on the roles of men and women in the family. The survey said 83 percent of Filipinos agreed that a man's role is to earn money, while a woman's is to care for the home and the family.The numbers struck me, not because they were surprising, but because they quietly reflected a reality many Filipino families have long lived with. Behind the simple description of "caring for the home" is a huge amount of work that often goes unnoticed.

In many Filipino households, the day begins with a woman already awake, preparing breakfast before the sun rises. She makes sure that the children are ready for school. She multitasks. She cooks while keeping an eye on the laundry, washes the dishes, sweeps the floor, or calls her parents or in-laws to make sure everything is well. Later in the day, she sits with the children to help with homework. She then prepares dinner while talking to and cheering up a child who is having a difficult day. Yet when the day ends, this labor often remains unseen, absorbed quietly into the rhythm of family life. Tomorrow will be the same.

Economists call this unpaid care work.

I believe that care work supports the entire economy, even if it does not appear in payroll records or financial reports. It is essential to everyday life, yet it rarely appears in the economic statistics that shape public discussions.