Economists call the line between paid and unpaid work the “production boundary.” Increasingly, the ordinary activities of life involve crossing that boundary. When I use online banking to deposit a check or when I book my own hotel room, I am crossing the production boundary, substituting my own unpaid work for the paid work of bank tellers or travel agents. None of this unpaid work is counted directly in gross domestic product. The digital economy, like the offline household and volunteer economy, is linking us in exchanges that are hard to measure in traditional economic terms, although they create much unpaid value. Yet it is clearer than ever how much time we are spending on the “wrong” side of the production boundary.

Source: New York Times June 26, 2020 09:00 UTC