Providers and co-providers: wives and female heads of families in unstable employment conditions and unemployment

Abstract

This article is based on two different sets of data. On the one hand, there are the changes in the labor market that have taken place as of the 1990s, which redefined the pattern of absorption of the labor force. On the other hand are the related changes in family arrangements regarding the work of their members, as well as changes in the role of women in the family and in society. The focus here is the character of the profiles of participation of wives and female heads of families who are providers or co-providers in their nuclear families. There has been increasing growth of the importance of the participation of these woman in the labor market, under unstable labor relationships and unemployment. At the same time, they have been taking on more significant roles in the composition of family income. Although they often hold down unstable jobs, in comparison with other members of their families, only wives and female heads of families showed increased participation and occupation between 1990 and 2003. Especially important is the segment of working wives, half of whom under unstable or informal labor relationships, who show less reduction in the proportion of non-unstable relationships during this period. The occupational profiles of members of the family groups in which these women participate are analyzed, and the families of wives and female heads of families who work and do not work were compared. The contribution of these women to the incomes of their nuclear families has softened the fall in income of their households and clearly attenuated the increasing impoverishment in the São Paulo Metropolitan Region.