These issues were discussed extensively in the 1970s and 1980s.
All of these debates were somewhat put aside, but the idea of a wage for housework was also of interest to researcher Louise Toupin, who wrote a book in French that has been translated into English, on the demand for pay for housework. This claim is extremely interesting because it provided for a salary to be paid to the homemaker, male or female.
This claim has been somewhat set aside, but measures such as CERB have nevertheless given us a glimpse of what it might look like to pay people for [Technical Difficulties]. Although this measure was intended to replace a salary, staying home still gave many families and many women a boost, in particular.
The issue of socialization concerns all the services that have been set up independently by users. For example, in Quebec, in the 1970s, before the early childhood centres were created, there were popular day cares. The idea was to give resources to the communities so that they could take charge of care services themselves. I think that’s a very interesting idea.
Finally, there were several suggestions on the issue of reforms, such as including homemakers in the labour force and providing old age benefits to people who have been at home in an attempt to reduce poverty at the end of life or in the event of divorce, for example. It was also suggested to facilitate the recognition of women’s job skills when they re-enter the labour market after having children.
In the 1970s and 1980s, a number of ideas were proposed by organizations, unions and women's groups.