ABSTRACT
Reviewing the existing literature on informal work that has drawn a distinction between men’s and women’s endeavor in this realm, it will be here shown that most studies do little more than identify the amount of informal work undertaken by men and women, whether one gender participates in such work to a greater extent than the other and/or whether there are gender inequalities in informal wages (e.g., Fortin et al., 1996; Hellberger and Schwarz, 1986; Lemieux et al., 1994; Leonard, 1994; McInnis-Dittrich, 1995; Van Eck and Kazemeier, 1989). On the whole, the work relations and motives underpinning the informal work undertaken by men and women have not been investigated. Instead, it is more often the case that such relations and rationales are simply read off from other findings such as their wage levels. Take, for example, women’s informal employment. Based on the finding that women receive relatively low wages for their informal work, such endeavor has been generally portrayed as low-paid exploitative market-like work and argued to be conducted by women for the purpose of making additional money “on the side” so as to help the household get by (e.g., Howe, 1990; Jordan et al., 1992; Leonard, 1994; MacDonald, 1994; Morris, 1987, 1995; Rowlingson et al., 1997). Indeed, such assumptions have been strongly reinforced by a raft of studies analyzing domestic service work (e.g., Anderson, 2001a,b; Boris and Prugl, 1996; Dagg, 1996; Hondagneu-Sotelo, 2001; Salmi, 1996).
