Working Paper: 549

Time Allocation and Gender Inequalities:
A Time-use Comparison

Jyoti Thakur
Reimeingam Marchang

 

Abstract

Although significant progress has been achieved toward gender equality in recent decades, inequities based on gender norms, stereotypes, and unequal distribution of household work and care work responsibility still exist between women and men. Women and men's time usage patterns alter dramatically as a result of life events such as marriage and children. The data clearly shows that women in India bear the brunt of the unpaid work and therefore despite having high educational achievements, their participation in paid work is shockingly low. Firstly, this paper investigates whether there has been an increase in similarity between men and women's time utilization in India by using dissimilarity index (DI). Secondly, the paper uses data for 1998 & 2019 time-use surveys to examine whether over a period of time there is any change in the way men and women allocate their time across different activities in India. Finally, the paper explores the impact of marriage and education on the allocation of time across different activities.

 

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