Brazilian women spend nearly twice as much time as men on unpaid care work, according to data from the Brazilian Institute of Geography and Statistics [1].
This disparity creates a systemic barrier to professional advancement. When domestic responsibilities fall disproportionately on women, it restricts their ability to pursue promotions, higher education, or full-time employment opportunities.
Maíra Machado, a sociology master and research director at Instituto Locomotiva, said the imbalance in unpaid care activities directly limits the professional trajectories of women during an interview with CNN Brasil.
According to the IBGE data cited by Machado, women dedicate approximately two times more time than men to these unpaid tasks [1]. This labor includes childcare, elderly care, and general housework, tasks that are essential to society but remain economically invisible.
Machado said the current distribution of labor necessitates the implementation of specific public policies. She said the state must provide support systems to better distribute these responsibilities between genders to ensure workplace equity.
Without such interventions, the professional gap persists. The domestic workload often forces women to accept lower-paying roles or flexible positions that offer fewer benefits and slower career progression—effectively penalizing them for providing essential care.
This trend reflects a broader sociological challenge in Brazil where traditional gender roles continue to dictate the division of labor within the home. Machado said that addressing this inequality is not only a matter of fairness but a requirement for economic efficiency.
“Brazilian women spend nearly twice as much time as men on unpaid care work.”
The disparity in unpaid care work highlights a structural economic gap where women's labor is undervalued. By quantifying this 'double burden,' the data suggests that gender equality in the workforce cannot be achieved through corporate hiring quotas alone; it requires a shift in domestic labor distribution and state-funded infrastructure, such as childcare, to decouple caregiving from gender.
