Give and Take in Families: Studies in Resource Distribution.

The theme of this book is the distribution of resources both within and without the family in the United Kingdom. In social policy research this provides a relatively new and wide focus which has important implications for policy implementation. The original aim for this book was to open up the black box of the household and to explore the ways that resources are distributed between household members. However the household cannot be isolated and must be located in the context of other households and through the medium of the labor market state income support social and personal services and the law. The majority of the studies in this book focus on households whose members are linked by ties of marriage and/or parenthood especially the nuclear families where mothers are at home with young children. This book includes research on single parents and on households where both parents with young children are in full-time employment. Since factors which affect the distribution of resources within households are not static this book also includes studies of those whose members are at different stages in the life cycle--the households of the elderly and those caring for them and households undergoing changes namely divorce and unemployment which are likely to have major implications for household structure and resources. The principal concern is with gender relations. Women act as a resource in caring for other people (husbands children relatives other peoples children) both in their own and other households and they also perform a role in providing household income and in transforming money into goods and services. In these twin roles women are also recipients of resources such as time money food and the extent to which they are cared for by others which enable or constrain them. Children are also to share unequally in the division of household resources.