This project examines how women workers and employers have navigated the informal economic sector, especially in the industries of household and personal services, as well as work/family balance, in the Lansing-East Lansing metropolitan region and assesses employment strategies before and during the COVID-19 pandemic. The pandemic and economic crises in 2020 have impacted women specifically, with layoffs in service sector jobs and compounded childcare crises. Families engage in the labor market through social networks and “brokerage institutions” such as churches, schools, and neighborhoods, to find household service workers as well as work. The research design employs mixed methodologies and includes over 32 in-depth interviews along with archival data analysis to map and model the regional political economy and networks in the connections between formal and informal work in mid-Michigan economy. Our findings suggest that key brokerage institutions include schools, including daycare centers, public K-12 schools, and universities are vital to the Lansing-East Lansing regional economy, and when these closed down during the pandemic, key labor resources and household support systems broke down, requiring women to stay home with children. Eldercare and house-cleaning services also were diminished, especially in the informal sector service sector. The Lansing-East Lansing region is unevenly developed as certain jobs and household incomes were maintained through remote work, while in-person essential household care jobs were drastically cut. Consequential pandemic policy solutions did not fully reach these individual workers, as single person businesses were not eligible for Paycheck Protection Program. Almost every respondent lost income, client base, economic capacity, or services due to the pandemic. Some families found resilience in deeper family or friendship ties. Workers learned they needed to negotiate for better wages or opportunities, especially those that could leverage entrepreneurship. Brokerage institutions were the key to finding household help and jobs.

This joint project with Dr. Sejuti Das Gupta began in October 2020, when we applied for two grant proposals, submitting a letter of intent for the Russell Sage Foundation on November 11th 2020, (rejected) and to MSU’s Center for Regional Economic Innovation (REI) Co-Learning Plan projects funded by the US Economic Development Administration on November 20th, 2020. We were awarded $8000.00 for the study by REI in December 2020; the funding period covered 2-1-2021 to 10-1-2021. In January of 2021, we interviewed and hired a JMC undergraduate student as member of the research team to do bibliographic work and project organization and a graduate student in Human Development and Family studies with a degree in counseling to serve as a research assistant. Our IRB for the project was approved in February of 2021. We completed 32 interviews between May and October of 2021. See our report for U.S. Economic Development Administration (EDA) and University Center for Regional Economic Innovation, Michigan State University, by Louise Jezierski, PhD, Sejuti Das Gupta, PhD. Caitlin Edwards, Anna Cool, Carter Oselett. September 30, 2021.** This is the scholarship I am submitting for FAC to review. We have a draft of one of three planned articles for submission to academic journals, with a plan to work on them during the summer of 2022.