The historical evolution of the cost of social reproduction in the United States, 1959–2012

Katherine A. Moos

Review of Social Economy, 2021, vol. 79, issue 1, 51-75

Abstract: Using data from the US Bureau of Economic Analysis (BEA) National Income and Product Accounts (NIPA) – including a BEA satellite account that imputes monetary values for unwaged household production – this paper provides a feminist, class-based framework for estimating the annual cost of social reproduction in the United States from 1959 to 2012. The key finding is that for US working-class households, the cost of socially reproducing labor-power has risen relative to the cost of employing labor-power, implying that employers are paying for a decreasing proportion of the total societal cost of socially reproducing labor-power. These results are discussed in relationship to growing income inequality and the contradictory role of the state in the US neoliberal era.

Date: 2021
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DOI: 10.1080/00346764.2019.1703031

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