Home, Work and the Shifting Geographies of Care

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Notes

Notes

1 Canada introduced the Family Allowance in 1945. It was a monthly payment to all families with children regardless of income – i.e. a universal benefit, not means-tested. Beginning in 1978, the system was repeatedly restructured. A refundable child tax credit aimed at low and moderate income families was introduced, and family allowance to better off families was scaled back. By 1993, family allowance and the refundable child tax credit were replaced by an income-tested child tax benefit; the most recent version is the Canada Child Tax Benefit. This federal assistance to families with children is now delivered primarily through the tax system.

2 The division also has important implications for women's paid work outside the home. As demonstrated by the gendered wage gap and the continued existence of gendered occupational segregation (into low-paying, less prestigious jobs such as clerical and sales jobs) (Fortin and Huberman, 2002).

3 This and other quotes in this section are from England, et al. (2007). They are from participants in a transdiciplinary study of home care in Ontario. Information on publications from this project can be obtained from the Principal Investigator, Patricia McKeever, at the Faculty of Nursing, the University of Toronto.

4 In 2005, the first beginnings of a national early learning and child care program were laid down (including bilateral agreements with provinces and territories), but this was later dismantled.

5 The important exception here is the Province of Quebec that introduced $5 dollar a day highly-subsidized childcare 1997. It is now $7 a day, but may increase to $10.

6 See http://www.cic.gc.ca/english/work/caregiver/index.as.

7 The program is open to men as well, however only a tiny proportion of the participants in this program are men, although that appears to be on the increase. That may well be because the LCP, like its predecessors was developed as a solution to the child care crisis, but it also explicitly includes care for “elderly persons or persons with disabilities” and the men may well be employed in caring for elderly or disabled adults.

8 Felicity (a pseudonym) was a participant in a Toronto-based project about the Live-in Caregivers Program (see England and Stiell, 1997; Stiell and England, 1997, 1999).

9 See http://www.cic.gc.ca/english/work/apply-how-caregiver.asp/.