Costing the superwoman: How much pay is a housewife worth?

Traditionally, women have always worked, yet their domestic contribution has remained invisible and not recognised. Carol Natukunda  discusses the issue

You are in the kitchen preparing the day’s meal. The baby is screaming for your attention. Right in front of you is a pile of clothes for washing. The sink is overflowing with dirty utensils, and the house is generally dirty, with socks strewn all over the floor, by, you know who!

By the time you are done, you are tired to the bone. Come bedtime, even before you doze off, the baby is up demanding to be fed. Meanwhile, hubby simply snores away! And this is your daily routine.

Traditionally, women have always worked, yet their domestic contribution has remained invisible. So goes the old adage: “Man may work from sun to sun, but woman’s work is never done.” Since time immemorial, society has placed immense value to the work done outside the home that is measured by pay, relegating domestic work, mostly by women, to obscurity.

Call them machines; women do far too much un-quantified work. Nancy Kabami, 40, says 1n the past 13 years she has been married, she wakes up at 5:00am daily, prepares breakfast, makes the children ready for school and drops them off, before embarking on her routine household chores. By 4:00pm, she is dashing to pick the children, prepare supper, and help them with homework.

“My back is hurting!” Kabami says. Not that she is complaining; Kabami is happy she takes care of her family, but she feels drained. “The man comes home, bounces in the sofa and beckons you over to bring the remote control, never mind you have been walking up and down the house trying to put things in order the whole day,” laments Kabami.

The world over, the debate is raging: Shouldn’t housewives like Kabami get a monthly pay for the services they render?

In India, tempers are flaring as the government considers a proposal for men to pay between 10% and 20% of their income to their wives, if the latter should stay at home and do household chores.

India’s Women and Child Development minister, Krishna Tirath, argues that this would give housewives some financial independence and formally recognize their role in society.

Teopista Ssentongo, the workers’ MP, supports the move. Ssentongo argues that in the event that Uganda, one time, fixes a minimum wage for salaried workers, then husbands should be asked to pay their full-time housewives about 40% of their salaries.

“As a housewife, you have to go to the market, you are the chef, the gardener, and on top of that take care of everyone in the home, including the man who sometimes behaves like a baby!” argues Ssentongo.

She explains that in the past, a man would make it a point to buy his wife a new gomesi every Christmas in appreciation for the contribution they make. “Today’s men do not do so. Men’s work has turned into women’s work. It is a shame!” Sentongo regrets.

Working woman

Ssentongo argues that working mothers do way too much on top of their work outside home. Women who work for pay still come home and continue to take care of their families. This dual work places the women at a disadvantage compared to men.

“You are rushing home to check on the children, clean the house and fix a cup of evening tea. The man will probably sit with legs up in the sofa, or just go hang out with the boys,” says Ssentongo.

With the number of women, both in formal and informal employment growing, doing household chores means working double shift.

“There is a backlash,” says Solome Nakaweesi-Kimbugwe, an outspoken feminist. “Working women are at pain to prove they can excel in all areas – outstanding wife, mother and employee, exerting immense pressure on them and subsequent marriage break-up.”

Nakaweesi says our society is still patriarch in the sense that women’s labour is not quantified. “They think a good woman should work without asking anything in return.

On the other hand, men’s labour is paid for and celebrated,” Nakaweesi says.

Non-monetary reward

However, Nakaweesi says, women, as a social group, ought to be paid, not by their husbands, but by society and the state.

She argues that the payment should be non-monetary, given that by all means, no amount of money can adequately compensate the hours and effort a woman puts in to keep a family going.

“I believe if you ask a man to pay, he will not do it consistently, or it would be a source of conflict resulting in domestic violence. But society and the state should pay for that labour in non-monetary terms,” says Nakaweesi.

She explains that in her work as in international women’s rights activist, they have been trying to work out a system of capturing the free labour rendered by women in the national statistics and quantifying that by attaching the monetary value.

This would then be converted into specific interventions and programmes that appreciate that women’s labour increases the support on childcare; health, education; wellness and care for other women; and reduce maternal mortality and infant mortality rates.

Women in agriculture

According to a 2000 IFAD study, agriculture, which is the main source of income for rural households in Uganda, is the main occupation of women.

Nationwide, 72% of all employed women and 90% of all rural women work in agriculture. Women usually undertake sowing, harvesting, head-loading of produce, crop-drying, winnowing, seed selection, pig and poultry-rearing and bartering sunflower seeds for oil.

It is estimated that women do 55% of land preparation, 85% of the planting, 85% of the weeding and 98% of all food processing, while 70% of decisions to market are made by men.

Traditionally, men are responsible for the cash crops, but tend to withdraw much of their labour if those crops decrease in profitability. Men also dominate the more remunerative activities in agriculture.

When products such as vegetables are destined for the market, rather than for home consumption, men will perform the tasks more.

Women and children are delegated the farm tasks that are tedious and time consuming like head-loading produce to market, but when bicycles are available for transport, men use them to transport the crop.

Men mainly perform the marketing of high-value cash crops and cattle, whereas women normally sell low-value produce, animals and chicken.

What men say

Frederick Wapakhabulo, a communications consultant

I give her some cash to spend on herself, buy for herself basic commodities and maybe step out once in a while with her friends. It is not necessary to pay her a salary.

It will, in a way, be demeaning her because that is her role as a wife. She is not a worker; she just sacrifices for the family.

Dan Kazungu, the head of Mass Communication Department at Kampala University (Jinja Branch)

I parted ways with my fiancée after she asked for a salary of sh80,000 per month to be a housewife. Couples should not exploit each other.

I do not believe that husbands exploit their housewives by not paying them. Earning money is not easy. You are up and down to make sure there is roof over the family and there is food on the table. You are on tension when the woman is not working.

On average, an urban housewife uses a maid to clean the house, wash utensils and clothes and cook food, and the husband pays the maid.

Even for the working woman, the housework is tremendously reduced because the maid does almost everything.

Expert opinion

Stephen Langa of Family Life Network says the idea of a salary makes marriage appear like a contract. “It is in a contract where you count scores.

If I wash utensils twice in a row, then you should also wash them twice. Marriage should be 100% commitment, in all aspects,” Langa says.

He says couples should agree on how to spend it. “What I recommend is pocket money to help the woman while she is at home. For instance, she may need to take a friend out for coffee. The family budget should consider the money a woman needs,” he adds.

Rev Peter Matovu, the director of ‘Munnange’ Counselling Centre at Nkumba University, says both individuals in a home are indispensable. “Without the wife managing the home, it will be difficult for the husband to go out and earn. And without the husband going out to earn, it will be hard for the wife to manage the home,” he explains.

Should wives be paid? Email: hervision@newvision.co.ug, or by SMS – type ‘women’ (space), your comment & name and send to 8338