RIEB Seminar

15:30 - 17:00

Topic

When Work Does Not Substitute: Gender, Employment, Marriage and Time Poverty in India

Speaker

Aasheerwad DWIVEDI (Faculty of Management Studies, University of Delhi)

Abstract

Time poverty is increasingly recognised as a key dimension of well-being, yet evidence from developing countries remains limited. This paper examines how gender, marriage, and employment jointly shape time poverty in India. Using nationally representative data from the Indian Time Use Surveys 2019 and 2024, we construct a measure of time poverty based on extended System of National Accounts and estimate pooled logistic regression models for the overall, rural, and urban populations. To account for the endogeneity of women's labour force participation, we employ a control-function approach that corrects for selective entry into paid work. The results reveal substantial heterogeneity across demographic groups. Married women engaged in paid employment consistently face the highest probability of being time poor. This relationship remains robust across rural and urban areas and persists after correcting for endogenous employment selection, suggesting that it is not merely driven by differences in who enters the labour market. Sensitivity analyses using alternative time-poverty thresholds and additional validation exercises yield similar conclusions. The findings challenge the assumption that paid employment necessarily reduces women's time constraints. Instead, they show that where gender norms sustain an unequal division of unpaid domestic and care work, employment adds to women's total workload rather than replacing unpaid responsibilities. Time poverty therefore reflects the interaction between labour market participation and household institutions. Policies aimed at increasing women's employment are unlikely to improve well-being unless accompanied by investments in care infrastructure, family-friendly workplace arrangements, and measures that promote a more equitable sharing of unpaid care work.