Foreign Domestic Helpers Hiring and Women’s Labor Supply in Hong Kong

Abstract

Based on the data from Hong Kong Panel Study of Social Dynamics (HKPSSD), this article investigates the effect of hiring foreign domestic helpers (FDH) on married women’s labor supply in Hong Kong. The results show, hiring FDHs promotes female’s labor force participation in Hong Kong, increases the amount of time they spend on paid work, and reduces their share of housework. Further analysis suggests that the effects of hiring helpers vary substantially across different socioeconomic groups. The positive effect of hiring FDHs on work hours is the greatest among those who hold an upper-secondary education, live in subsidized housing, and are married to men who earn a relatively low income. These women work longer hours to meet their family’s ends. For married women of higher socioeconomic status, the effect of FDHs hiring on work time is insignificant, suggesting that their relief from housework contributes not to their market work but rather to the support for a more leisurely lifestyle.

Notes

1 The population-averaged model (PAM) is fitted using generalized estimating equations (GEE), in which the autocorrelation structure is treated as a nuisance. For this type of model, the structure of the residual autocorrelation can be estimated from the data and used to choose the working correlation matrix. Here, we choose the structure of the working correlation matrix to be exchangeable, meaning that individuals from the same household have the same correlations (reference) (Neuhaus et al. 1991).

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Guangye He

Guangye He ([email protected]) is a junior research fellow at Nanjing University, Department of Sociology. She earned her PhD from the Hong Kong University of Science and Technology in 2016. Her research focuses on family sociology, social stratification, and quantitative methodology in sociology. She has published in Social Science Research, Sociological Studies, Chinese Sociological Review, Chinese Journal of Sociology, China Review, Journal of Contemporary China, and many others.

Xiaogang Wu

Xiaogang Wu (Ph.D., UCLA, 2001) is Chair Professor of Social Science, the Founding Director of the Center for Applied Social and Economic Research (CASER) at HKUST. He is also affiliated with Division of Public Policy at HKUST. His research interests include social stratification and mobility, labor markets and economic sociology, and quantitative methodology. His previous work has appeared in Annual Review of Sociology, American Sociological Review, American Journal of Sociology, Social Forces, Demography, Social Science Research, and other leading journals in area studies.