The quality of investments made in children, however, is correlated with households' socio-economic status, providing a channel for the transmission of poverty and inequality across generations.10’ In order to prevent social inequality deepening over time and to equalize real opportunities, macroeconomic policies need to support adequate investment in the childhood development of low-income households in particular. ’02This direct care represents a critical component of the unpaid labour necessary to keep an economy going, and which, because of its long-term consequences, needs to be recognized in macroeconomic policy. Care work is necessary to the investment in human beings required to support a viable macroeconomic environment.