| This study argues that the division of labor within the family and subsistence pressures greatly condition the labor supply response of its members and the preference of secondary workers for alternative work arrangements, such as self-employment and employment in cottage industries (employment in the informal sector), which are more compatible with family care. Existing studies of the informal sector consider primarily the production and employment aspect (labor demand), and assume that workers prefer to work in the formal sector. Yet, evidence does not support this presumption of job search models that the informal sector is a stepping-stone to employment in the formal sector.; In particular, subsistence constraints deeply affect the labor supply response of secondary workers (generally married women). At low incomes, they are called upon to help make ends meet, whereas at higher levels of income emancipation from their role of home keepers helps them develop stronger ties with the labor market. Accordingly, the uncompensated labor supply elasticity of secondary workers with respect to wages is negative at low levels of income and positive at higher incomes, the entire labor supply schedule being shaped like a reverse S (S-shaped). Primary workers, on the other hand, have a labor supply elasticity near zero at all levels of income, because they are socialized into being the main bread earner. These mutations in labor supply behaviors, and the resulting U-shaped relationship between labor force participation of women and levels of income, is expected to be most pronounced in the course of industrialization, equating levels of income with levels of development.; Data from a household survey of the rural Philippines are consistent with the hypothesized labor supply responses for low-income families, whereas findings from studies of more industrialized countries are consistent with the expected labor supply responses for higher-income families. Further, studies find a concentration in alternative forms of employment of poor women in particular, as expected in light of these labor supply behaviors and the heavy time constraints family care imposes on secondary workers. |
