Outsourcing for How Long? Factors and Duration of Employing Foreign Live-in Domestic Helpers

A remarkable rise in outsourcing domestic labor has been well documented, but the scope of the existing studies is limited. This study aims at investigating the factors and duration of using live-in domestic help in Hong Kong. The study also aims at disentangling the cross-sectional patterns in using paid domestic help into two different patterns: differential risks in the transition into the practice and the differential risks in the transition out from the practice. This study analyzes retrospective life-history data from a representative household survey ( N = 2003). Discrete-time logit models were employed. The results show that employing live-in helpers is a stable practice that could last for more than a decade. Yet, the factors for using and ending the practice are different. The results show that the flexible outsourcing framework could satisfactorily explain the families employing live-in helpers but is less applicable in explaining the duration of the practice.

Does live-in domestic help reduce unpaid household labor? The paradox of intensive parenting and domestic outsourcing

This two-stage mixed-method study pulls the literature of domestic outsourcing and intensive parenting together to investigate the role of employing live-in domestic helpers in the time-use patterns of household labor among working parents in Hong Kong. In the first stage, regression models are used to analyze data from a representative household survey of working parents ( N = 791). Regression results show that working parents who hire live-in domestic help spent less time in housework. Yet, the reduction in housework time was partially offset by the managing tasks brought about by the use of live-in help. Working parents with live-in helpers also spent significantly more time on childcare than did working parents without such help. To interpret the regression results, the study draws on qualitative data from in-depth interviews ( N = 20) to unpack the meaning of hiring help and its relationship with the notion and practices of parenting. The findings highlight that the use of live-in domestic help is a specialization strategy to strive for perfection in parenting for parents who juggle work, childcare and household chores. By outsourcing household chores and more routinized childcare tasks to the helpers, working parents, especially mothers, can focus on emotional bonding and tasks conducive to the development of their children.

Romeo and Juliet in late-communist Poland: Deconstructing the myth of Shakespeare’s play

Romeo i Julia z Saskiej Kępy (‘Romeo and Juliet from Saska Kępa’) is a Polish film from 1988, which showcases the idea(l) of true love in late-communist Warsaw. He (Leopold) is an alcohol-wasted, promising painter, she (Sabina) comes to Warsaw from the country and finds employment as a domestic help. They find their love space in a boiler-room in a ruined tenement house in the prestigious and elitist district of Saska Kępa in Warsaw. The film is an adaptation of Shakespeare’s play of sorts; although there are references to Shakespeare’s tragedy and parallels are more or less detectable, the film rather addresses the status of the play in the Polish culture of the late 1980s, in the context of the drab reality of Poland just before the transition in 1989 (not that it anticipates it). Thus, it can be possibly classified as what Sanders (2006) views as appropriation. Our aim is to explore the functioning and role of the Romeo and Juliet myth in the (popular) culture of decadent communist Poland and its treatment in Skórzewski’s film: how certain motifs from the play, especially those associated with the myth of ideal love, were developed in a modernized version of Shakespeare’s tragedy, thus reflecting certain topical problems, which the director addresses appropriating this myth. Rather than showing love between the two figures impossible due to the rivalry between two families/opposing groups, Skórzewski finds obstacles for such love in the drab reality of the late 1980s and social differences between the two lovers. The director makes them mature people, neither are they stunningly beautiful, nor living a comfortable life.

“Goodness and Kindness”: Long-Distance Caregiving Through Volunteers During the COVID-19 Lockdown in India

Objectives The first Covid-19 lockdown in India was announced on March 24, 2020, with less than 4 hours’ notice, leaving older adults without access to domestic help and paid caregivers. As traditional caregiving models ceased to function in the new setup, relatives of older adults turned to strangers and volunteers in an effort to provide urgent care to their older family members. This study explores the role of volunteers in meeting the immediate needs of older adults during the lockdown. Methods A pan-India group of volunteers was formed during the lockdown on a popular social media website to connect people of all ages in need of help with those able to offer assistance. A sample of 242 messages pertaining to older adults was extracted for quantitative content analysis. Results All but 2 requests were placed by adult relatives of older adults. Requests covered a number of needs, some of which were directly tied to the pandemic and lockdown, while others were general in nature but were greatly exacerbated by recent events. Discussion The use of social media to encourage acts of kindness at a time of crisis was an innovative attempt to meet the immediate needs of older adults. The lockdown, however, exposed the lack of dedicated supports and services for older adults in India.

WHAT SHAPES ADULT SONS’ INCENTIVE FOR PARENT CARE IN JAPAN? EFFECTS OF WORK AND FAMILY CIRCUMSTANCES

In Japan, because of marked sociodemographic shifts such as a growing number of older adults in need of care and fewer siblings in younger generations, adult sons are increasingly likely to be called upon to meet parental care needs while at working age. Using data from 1,183 employed men (M age = 44.6), our aim in this study was to explore work- and family-related factors that affect their incentives for parental caregiving, a potential component of their psychological preparedness for fulfilling care responsibility. Specifically, focusing on these sons’ workplace environment, living arrangements, and the quality of relationship with parents, we sought to identify whether and how these factors influenced their desire to provide different types of care (e.g., domestic help, ADL assistance). Regression analysis revealed differential associations between work- and family-related factors and sons’ desire for parental caregiving depending on type of care and parents’ gender. For their desire to provide domestic help and attend parents when seeing a doctor, live-in sons were more likely to desire to provide care regardless of parents’ gender. Whereas the quality of parent-child relationships was significantly associated with their desire to care for both parents, whether they had a supervisor to talk with about family issues had a significant effect only on that for their mother. On the basis of these findings, we discuss workplace needs for support to help sons continue work when they need to provide care.

Food away from home in Brazil: the role of sociodemographic factors and family structure

Purpose The purpose of this paper is to estimate the determinants of per capita expenditures with disaggregate food away from home (FAFH) including variables such as family structure. Design/methodology/approach The authors estimated a system of expenditure equations (SUR method) with data from the latest Consumer Expenditure Survey of 2008–2009 – (or Pesquisa de Orçamentos Familiares – POF), considering the complex sample design in estimation procedures. Findings The authors found a positive relationship between woman’s opportunity cost of time and FAFH spending only when the authors considered the effects of wife’s education in higher income class. Hiring domestic help diminishes FAFH spending, mostly for lunch and dinner time meals. The presence of children in the household decreases the consumption of most FAFH categories. Social implications Even though, Brazilian FAFH consumption has been increasing, the presence of women in the labor market seems to play a small role in the determining this type of food consumption. Family structure plays an important role in determining FAFH. Originality/value The contribution of the paper is to estimate FAFH expenditures at the disaggregate level and by income class for Brazil. The authors also included alternative family structure specifications as determinants in the model. The authors considered the sample design characteristics in estimation.