Kerala’s domestic service economy has always been labour-rich but structure-poor. For decades, the system has functioned on a quiet contradiction. Domestic workers perform economically essential tasks, yet are treated neither as workers with rights nor as entrepreneurs with agency. They remain trapped in a space where effort is real but growth is impossible. The future of Kerala’s household services does not lie in protecting this arrangement, but in transforming it. The most powerful transformation available is the deliberate transition of domestic workers into micro-entrepreneurs.
At present, most domestic workers operate as individuals selling time rather than services. Their income depends on personal negotiation, emotional labour, and power asymmetry. Skill development is informal, pricing is inconsistent, and work continuity is fragile. Illness, migration, or household changes can erase income overnight. This is not an outcome of personal failure; it is a structural design flaw. When labour is not allowed to become enterprise, it stagnates.
A domestic worker to micro-entrepreneur transition policy corrects this flaw by changing the identity of the worker within the system. The worker is no longer seen as hired help, but as a service provider. This is not merely a semantic shift. It alters how work is priced, delivered, insured, trained, and scaled. The unit of value becomes the service, not the person’s availability.
Kerala is uniquely positioned to implement such a transition. Literacy levels allow rapid onboarding into basic digital tools. Local self-governance structures can support identification and verification. Cooperative traditions make collective enterprise socially acceptable. Most importantly, there is already steady demand for domestic services across income groups. The market exists. What is missing is a pathway for workers to enter it as economic actors.
The transition does not require forcing workers into formal entrepreneurship overnight. It requires creating a graduated pathway. At the entry level, a worker can be registered as a solo service provider with a simple identity, skill tag, and service category. Over time, the same worker can expand into a small service unit, employing others, specialising in niches, or affiliating with neighbourhood service hubs. Policy’s role is to remove friction at each stage of this progression.
Skill certification is central to this shift. Today, domestic workers are assumed to be unskilled regardless of experience. This erases years of tacit knowledge. A transition policy would recognise cleaning, cooking, caregiving, appliance handling, and home organisation as skill domains with defined competencies. Certification does not exist to exclude, but to signal quality and enable pricing differentiation. When skills are visible, income mobility becomes possible.
Equally important is the provision of basic enterprise infrastructure. A micro-entrepreneur needs tools that an individual worker does not. These include billing mechanisms, simple contracts, service descriptions, grievance redressal, and access to insurance. The state does not need to build all of this directly. Its role is to standardise templates, accredit platforms, and ensure interoperability so that workers are not locked into exploitative intermediaries.
The psychological dimension of this transition should not be underestimated. Many domestic workers have internalised the belief that entrepreneurship is not meant for them. A policy that explicitly frames them as service providers disrupts this narrative. It sends a signal that ownership and agency are expected outcomes, not rare exceptions. This shift in self-perception is as important as any financial incentive.
For households, the transition simplifies relationships. Instead of employing individuals, households engage service providers. This reduces ambiguity around roles, time, and responsibility. It also reduces social tension, as expectations are contractual rather than emotional. Importantly, it does not remove warmth or human connection; it simply removes dependency as the organising principle.
There is a strong gender justice case embedded in this policy. Domestic work is feminised labour, and informality has historically been justified under the guise of flexibility. In reality, flexibility without structure benefits the buyer more than the provider. Micro-entrepreneurship allows women to retain flexible hours while gaining income stability, safety nets, and growth pathways. It also opens leadership opportunities within service collectives and franchises.
Migration adds another layer of urgency. As migrant workers increasingly fill domestic service roles, the absence of enterprise frameworks leaves them vulnerable to exploitation and social isolation. A transition policy that is inclusive of migrants allows them to register, skill up, and operate within legal and ethical boundaries. This improves workforce stability and reduces social friction.
Critics may fear that turning workers into entrepreneurs shifts risk onto the vulnerable. This concern is valid only if the transition is poorly designed. The policy must ensure that basic protections such as minimum pricing floors, insurance coverage, and access to grievance mechanisms are built in. Entrepreneurship here is not abandonment by the state; it is a reconfiguration of support.
From an economic standpoint, this transition unlocks a vast, undercounted sector. Domestic services currently operate largely outside formal economic metrics. Bringing them into the micro-enterprise fold expands the tax base gently, increases credit flow, and improves productivity without large capital expenditure. It is one of the few reforms that can simultaneously raise incomes and reduce inequality.
There is also a long-term cultural payoff. When domestic service providers are seen as entrepreneurs, social hierarchies soften. Respect shifts from class-based dominance to service-based professionalism. Children growing up in such households learn to interact with service providers as professionals, not dependents. This has subtle but lasting social impact.
By 2047, Kerala will face labour shortages, an ageing population, and rising expectations of quality in everyday life. Clinging to an informal domestic labour system will strain households and exhaust workers. Enabling domestic workers to become micro-entrepreneurs creates a self-reinforcing ecosystem where dignity, efficiency, and resilience coexist.
This is not about forcing everyone to start a company. It is about allowing those who already sustain households to also sustain themselves through ownership, skill recognition, and economic mobility. The future of Kerala’s domestic economy depends on whether it chooses to see domestic workers as expendable labour or as the next generation of service entrepreneurs.
