Family FriendlyJobs and Motherhood Career Penalties Across the Educational Spectrum: Panacea or Problem?

• In Event: 525 - Section on the Sociology of the Family Paper Session. Work and Family Intersections

Abstract

Motherhood career penalties can vary substantially for differently situated mothers. This paper focuses on a theoretically critical yet understudied element of such heterogeneity–work arrangements. Drawing on data from Statistics Canada’s Workplace and Employee Survey, the paper explores how flexible work arrangements shape motherhood penalties, and how this in turn varies by education. Findings reveal that work arrangements that facilitate the integration of employment and care (flexible hours, part-time work, and taking work home) tend to ease motherhood career disadvantages while those that promote ideal-worker norms that presume devotion to paid work above all do the opposite. Effects tend to be strongest for the most educated women. Less educated women are less likely to access job conditions that can reduce motherhood wage penalties, and if they do, they often make less of a difference.

Author

• Sylvia A. Fuller, The University of British Columbia