Domestic service and care: The crossroads from the private and the public standpoint

Abstract

Social and demographic changes lead to the need to reconfigure the usual functioning of care: while care demands increase and diversify, the actual capacity of their coverage by families decreases. The response from the State to this imbalance is clearly insufficient, typical of a welfare state that shifts the responsibility of care to the family and that is mainly assumed by women. Given this situation, families resort to the outsourcing of care. As a private strategy, the use of domestic service, which is no longer associated with social position, is particularly highlighted. Although the hiring of people for care implies a way of economically recognizing tasks that have never been considered productive, the regulation of the sector is insufficient and reflects a clear legal and political disinterest. So, we are at a crossroads where neither familiar or state care solutions are sufficient. First, the family cannot cover the care need. Secondly, the State does not provide adequate and sufficient public care alternatives. Overall, lack of regulation for domestic workers clearly differentiates these workers from others from a legal standpoint, causing a double vulnerability in workers and in the receptors of care.