Women Negotiating for Family Housing & Work: A Study on Quasi-Live-in Domestic Workers

Abstract

‘Women Negotiating for Family Housing & Work: A Study on Quasi-Live-in Domestic Workers’ examines the everyday lives and negotiations of a category of domestic workers, different from the mainstream, who barter work for obtaining family housing, and are referred to in the study as the ‘quasi-live-ins’ This term is used to refer to the workers because of unique restrictions and freedom they have since they are neither fully live-out nor completely live-in. Depending on tasks, employers, and initial negotiations, a worker may have the freedom of a live-out such as reporting only at specific times to complete agreed-upon chores or restrictions of a live-in who may have to be on ‘stand-by’ at all times. The central bargaining point for employment here is the family housing or SQ, which is in huge demand given location advantages. Unequal rights to basic urban resources in the city and the system of bartering work for ‘decent’ housing depresses their wages.