Salimah Valiani on “Valuing the Invaluable”: Care Work in Canada
PEF member Salimah Valiani is now the research economist at the Ontario Nurses Association. Just in time for Mothers’ Day ONA released a most excellent paper by Salimah, titled:
Valuing the Invaluable: Rethinking and respecting caring work in Canada
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Here is the abstract:
Using concepts of feminist economics, this paper demonstrates the range of ways in which carework is undervalued in Canada, from the labour of the unpaid care worker within the home, to the paid labour of the registered nurse in institutions. Through qualitative analysis of various caring occupations, and a comparison of wages of caring and non-caring occupations of different skill levels, it is shown that across skill levels, and regardless of gender or whether occupations are female-dominated, workers in caring occupations fare worse than workers in non-caring occupations in Canada.
The full paper is downloadable here. Congratulations Salimah for this important contribution!