The enduring debate over unpaid labour

Debate over the measurement of unpaid work - and hence over the underestima tion of women's work in labour force and national accounting statistics - i s not new. The author summarizes the main theoretical and practical issues addressed over many years, and describes the progress made on conceptual, t heoretical and methodological aspects of the question. as well as new issue s. And she responds to three types of continuing critique: that the efforts make no useful impact; that unpaid work is qualitatively different from ma rket work and should not be treated in the same way; and that the efforts a re theoretically misguided.