ABSTRACTThis article contrast the earnings of high and low-status workers in canada, the United States, Japan, the Republic of Korea and Taiwan (China) using the micro-data files of Luxembourg Income Study. By disaggregating existing definitions of care work, the author identifies occupations with lower and higher degrees of "social closure", revealing the associated care penalties and care bonuses cross-nationally. She also empirically measures the extent of similarities (and differences) beetween an within care economies in "liberal" adn "productivist developmental" substantial convergence within the international care market.