We know that Indian women do more work at home then men do, although nobody ever acknowledges that. Ask a housewife or work-at-home mom and they will tell you how undervalued they are. But consultancy firm, McKinsey’s report has finally put a number to this injustice. According to them, women in India do almost 10 times as much unpaid work as men. This is a much higher ratio than the global average, thus leaving them out of the formal workforce and unable to contribute to the economy.
Women are responsible for 17 per cent of India’s GDP, much less than in many nations, the McKinsey Global Institute said. China’s women account for 41 per cent of their GDP, those in sub-Saharan Africa 39 per cent and women in Latin America 33 per cent.
“India’s share of women’s contribution to GDP is lower than the global average of 37 per cent, and the lowest among all 10 regions in the world analysed by MGI,” McKinsey & Company India Director Rajat Gupta said.
“The below-potential contribution of women to India’s GDP today … contrasts with their higher share of unpaid care work such as cooking, cleaning, and taking care of children and older members of the family,” said the report, released on Monday.
“Globally, women spend roughly three times the amount of time spent by men on unpaid work. In India, the situation is more extreme – women perform 9.8 times the amount of unpaid care work than men.”
If that unpaid work were to be valued and compensated in the same way as paid work, it would contribute US$300 billion a year to India’s economic output, it added. That’s roughly about Rs 20 lakh crore.
Now if this gender parity were to be tackled, we are looking at some big time growth in our GDP, the report says. Merely getting more women into our non-farm labour workforce will not only result in a 1.4 per cent growth in our GDP annually, it could actually add Rs 46 lakh crore (US$700 billion) to India’s GDP in 2025, says the report.
So ladies, the next time some ‘well-meaning’ relative tells you to choose staying-at-home over work or tells you that women don’t work, just tell them the government needs you to be employed. We bet that will silence them.
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