The effect of family eldercare responsibilities on labour market Research Proposal - 1

The effect of family eldercare responsibilities on labour market involvement in South Africa and Canada - Research Proposal Example Gerontological research nowadays has placed emphasis more often on trends of family or informal care for the elderly in less developed countries Without the basic social services and assistance the vulnerable elderly in LDCs are a group exposed to significant risk. Nevertheless, according to Williams (2000), at present, majority of empirical findings indicate that a significant portion of the elderly population in developing countries depends on their own job or their families as their sole protection at later life periods. One important variable in the subject matter of family elder care is the participation rate of women in the labour force. Globally, the proportion of women in the work force grew significantly between 1970 and 1990 not including sub-Saharan Africa and ex-USSR where it dropped to some extent (Mueller 2000, 2). Former USSR, sub-Saharan Africa, Eastern and Southeast Asia have the highest rates whereas Southern and Western Asia and North Africa have the lowest (Muelle r 2000, 2-3). The rate of women’s labour force involvement may be indicative of the level of eldercare responsibility placed on women. A. Objective of the Research This study will try to compare the influence of family eldercare on the labour market, specifically the involvement of women in the work force, of South Africa (developing country) and Canada (developed country). It is the objective of this study to contribute to the insufficient understanding of the impact of informal or family care of the elderly on the composition of the labour market in developing and developed nations. B. Research Questions The primary question that this study will try to answer is what is the effect of family eldercare on the labour market of South Africa and Canada? More specifically, this study will attempt to address the following questions: a. Do women feel or think that they are more obliged to take care of the elderly in their families than their male counterparts? b. What is the typica l age at which working women initially take up obligations of eldercare? c. Do women decide to leave the work force if the obligation of caring for the elderly becomes onerous? C. Significance of Research Even though extensive consideration has been conferred over the recent years to the difficult endeavour of building equal status for men and women in the labour market, there have been comparatively very few methodical attempts to evaluate or measure the effect of family or informal eldercare obligations on males’ and females’ employment prospects, in that case, of labourers generally. Hence, this study hopes to give explanation of the implications for labour force involvement of choices made by women to assume eldercare responsibilities. II. Review of Related Literature Because of the dearth of available literature on the impact of family eldercare responsibilities on the labour market of South Africa and China the researcher will present in this section piecemeal in formation about ageing and the labour market of each of the two aforementioned countries. The next section will generally discuss the implication of family eldercare obligations on the labour market of both developing and developed countries. Nevertheless, it is important, above all, to discuss first the theoretical foundation of this study. A. Theoretical Paradigm In conceptualising the labour market in the perspective of the family, time distribution frameworks are suitable. The influential work