BOX 1.1 What is work? For this report, work is any activity that not only leads to the production and consumption of goods or services, but also goes beyond production for economic value. Work thus includes activities that may result in broader human well-being, both for the present and for the future. Work involves four sets of people: workers themselves; other entities such as employers who provide complementary inputs; consumers of the goods or services produced; and the rest of the world, which encompasses other people, society and the natural environment as well as future generations and the workers’ future selves. Work has both monetary and nonmonetary returns, tangible and intangible, with expressed and unintended consequences. Consider someone who is cooking. If cooking for himself, the cost as a producer is the opportunity cost of his time, which could have been spent doing something else; the return to him as a consumer is the nutrition from the meal. No other actors are involved, though there could be an impact on the environment. Now consider an individual cooking for his family. In this case the list of consumers grows. The tangible returns now include family nutrition, combined with the intangible
feeling of satisfaction along with their approbation—or feeling of frustration at being expected to perform the task or to forgo other activities such as earning money, pursuing education or participating in public life. Work, from a human development perspective, is about the degree of freedom individuals have in making choices about the work they do. However, if a domestic helper does the cooking, the situation changes. In this case there is a financial return to the worker, with the family not only acting as consumers, but also providing the complementary inputs. This activity may be differently remunerated depending on whether it is performed by a man or woman, a citizen or an immigrant. An individual who is coerced into performing the activity or who receives lower returns than those available to another is being exploited. This approach to work can also be applied to creative workers and volunteers. For example, in a restaurant a chef may pursue creativity in addition to income and experience professional satisfaction, self-esteem and dignity. Similarly, a volunteer at a community kitchen is not working for money but may be working for altruistic satisfaction.
Source: Human Development Report Office.
Creative expression contributes new ideas
The quality of work is as important as the quantity. Care work (discussed in chapter 4) is fundamentally important to human development. Care work includes housework, such as preparing meals for the family, cleaning the house and gathering water and fuel, as well as work caring for groups who cannot care for themselves— children, older people and family members who are sick—over both the short and long term. Voluntary work has been defined as unpaid noncompulsory work—that is, the discretionary free time individuals give without pay to activities performed either through an organization or directly for others outside their own household. Voluntary work is by definition an expression of free choice, intrinsically enhancing human development from the individual perspective. Creative expression contributes new ideas to society in works of art and cultural products, functional creations, scientific interventions and technological innovations. Creative work is desirable to many individuals because it
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affords them the opportunity to be innovative and self-expressive while striving to earn a living. Although creative work can be improvisational and derivative, it involves originality and uniqueness.
Work in different stages of the lifecycle Periods in a lifecycle are demographically, physically and culturally dependent and change over time. There are overlaps between the different stages, and the stages may vary among individuals. Work needs to be seen in the context of a human lifecycle and how it changes in different stages of that cycle. In many cases it is not a question of choice; decisions triggered by cultural expectations or absence of appropriate support force people to be in different work situations. Thus early marriage for girls or cuts in state-provided child care may result in pulling girls out of school—with lifelong effects on