Transcript Slide 1

Gender Responsive
Budgeting
Rhonda Sharp University of South Australia
Diane Elson Essex University
Presentation to FACSHIA, Canberra
June 24, 2009
Quiz Question
What is the impact of your program expenditure or revenue
raising on the existing pattern of gender differences and
inequalities in Australia?
Which box would you tick?
 Leaves inequalities between men and
women, boys and girls unchanged or is
‘gender neutral’.
 Reduces gender inequalities
 Increases gender inequalities
Have no idea.
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History
• Australia was a pioneer in the 1983 with the world’s first
Women’s Budget Statement that recognised that gender
mainstreaming needed to include a gender responsive
approach to the budget.
• It is through the budget (revenue raising and spending of
governments) that policies and programs are
implemented or become concrete.
Budget impacts and gender
mainstreaming
• Budgets impact on different groups of
women and men though a variety of
channels both direct and indirect
Direct channels of budgetary impact on
men and women differently via
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provision of services
infrastructure
income transfers
public sector jobs
taxation
user charges
budget decision making processes
Budgets also impact differently
on men and women indirectly
via
• Impact on the private sector through contracts to supply
the public sector.
• The macroeconomic impacts of the budget on aggregate
demand in the economy and thus on job creation and
economic growth.
Gender responsive budgeting
2 steps
• Unpacks the gender-differentiated
character of these direct and indirect
impacts of the budget with analysis
(Gender Budget Analysis)
• Actions that bring about changes to
policies, priorities and budgetary
processes so that the budget contributes
to promoting gender equity and equality.
Tips for doing gender budget
analysis
• Over the past 20 years a growing body of
conceptual frameworks, tools of analysis
and practical experience has been
developed internally to reveal the genderdifferentiated character of the impacts of
budgets. (See www.gender-budgets.org)
• What follows are some selected examples
relevant to Australia
Distinguish between sex and gender
• GBA is not simply a matter of sex disaggregation – i.e.
looking at whether more women benefit from a program
or policy than men or vice versa.
• The analysis needs to go beyond this to look at the
impact of government policies and their funding and
taxation on gender relations and family types.
• The post-war gender arrangements in Australia up until
the1970s are described as a strong version of a male
breadwinner model (sometimes referred to as a gender
order or regime).
• GBA needs to ask what model of gender relations is
implied by the policy and funding changes, how do
various household arrangements fare and is it likely to
promote gender equity and equality?
Typologies of gendered households
• Male breadwinner/female carer (traditional breadwinner
model)
• Male breadwinner/female part-time worker and carer
(modern or modified breadwinner model)
• Dual breadwinner/state or market carer model
• Dual breadwinner/dual carer model
• Other categories (eg sole parent, same sex couples,
single person).
How does gender intersect with other
categories?
• The intersections between
gender/class/location/sexuality/race/ethnicity/ are
important in assessing gender gaps and impacts of
budgets
• Tendency to focus on one category rather than further
disaggregate the analysis (eg World Bank studies on
poverty)
• The proposed Parental Leave policy is an example of
how different groups of women and men will fare
differently under its eligibility rules and funding
arrangements.
Impacts are different according to
lifecycle stage
• This is well illustrated with the introduction of the 1992
Superannuation Guarantee Charge in and tax
concessions for voluntary superannuation contributions
as different age groups of men and women are impacted
differently.
• Downstream gender impacts of policy and funding may
reinforce unequal gender relations (eg the lack of
Parental leave and affordable quality child care in early
life has implications for attachment to the workforce and
retirement incomes)
• Not doing something to improve gender power relations
can be more costly to the government when life cycle
effects are taken into account (eg the cost of domestic
violence).
Distinguish between budget impacts that
produce transformative changes in gender
relations vis-a-vis ‘here and now’
• Eg making changes to who receives child benefits
compared to changing the amount of cash payments to
families
• This requires, amongst other things, a recognition that
unpacking the gender impacts of budgets and policies is
shaped by the ‘unit of analysis’ and assumptions about
resource allocation within the family.
The unpaid economy
• Need to go beyond recognition of women’s unpaid work,
to recognize the unpaid economy
• Men work in the unpaid economy too, but women do
more of the work than men; and men and women tend to
do different tasks
• Unpaid work does not just support families, it supports
the paid economy, producing the labour force, saving
money for businesses, subsidizing the budget
• The unpaid economy, like the paid economy, responds
to changes in the financial system
• Policy to improve the efficiency of the paid economy can
transfer costs to the unpaid economy
• The unpaid economy is a critical element in the care
economy
Australia’s unpaid labour force at a
glance: some suggestions
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Average weekly hours of unpaid work, women of working age
Average weekly hours of unpaid work, women above working age
Average weekly hours of unpaid work, men of working age
Average weekly hours of unpaid work, men of above working age
• Market value of women’s unpaid work as % of GNP
• Market value of men’s unpaid work as % of GNP
• Subsidy to the budget provided by women’s unpaid work
• Subsidy to the budget provided by men’s unpaid work
• Average life time loss of earnings due to unpaid work, women
• Average life time loss of earnings due to unpaid work, men
The global financial crisis and the
unpaid economy
• The unpaid economy often expands in response to a
financial crisis, unlike the paid economy, which contracts
• Women and men substitute goods and services
produced unpaid at home for some of those purchased
in the market
• Can track this using special time use surveys at sentinel
sites, or by using monthly data on household
expenditures
• Women’s total workload ( paid and unpaid) may rise in a
recession, while that of men falls.
• Happens if men are more affected by unemployment
than women, more women get part-time or informal jobs
to try to compensate ( added worker effect); and women,
more than men , expand their unpaid work
Transference of costs to unpaid
economy
• Measures to improve efficiency of paid health
services may transfer costs to unpaid economy
Day surgery cuts costs of hospitals, but
discharged patients still need care- typically
provided unpaid by family, friends and
neighbours, especially women
• Encouraging use of working –age volunteers
(mainly women) in public services reduces costs
now-but may increase future poverty of elderly
women who lack superannuation benefits
• Need to check if policies are really cutting costs
or transferring costs
Strategy for the unpaid economy
• Recognize- through time use studies,
satellite accounts, policies to support
unpaid workers.
• Reduce- through policies to improve
housing, water and sanitation, access to
energy, and to provide paid care.
• Redistribute- though polices to enable
men to do more unpaid work and women
to do less.
Dilemmas of Care Economy
• Care for children, sick and disabled people, frail
elderly people
• Unpaid and paid, public and private, local and
migrant workers
• Challenge of caring for ageing population, while
promoting women’s labour market participation
• What mix of public provision, carers allowances,
tax breaks, visas for carers etc ?