Incentivizing Equality: How Work-Family Policies Affect Parenthood Penalties in 27 Countries

• In Event: 50609 - Gender Inequality in Work and Family Life

Abstract

A substantial body of scholarship contends that work-family policies play an important role in reducing gendered parenthood penalties in the labor market. However, recent studies have called this consensus into question. This study brings new evidence to bear on this important question. We leverage harmonized, longitudinal data for different-sex, dual-earner couples residing in 27 high-income countries to examine: 1) how national work-family policies affect parenthood penalties in the division of paid work; and 2) how work-family policies shape the impact of spouses’ relative economic resources on couples’ division of labor. Our results agree with previous research finding that work-family policies do affect parenthood penalties in labor market outcomes. We find that moderate-length paid leave (around 6 months) for mothers and greater childcare availability reduce parenthood penalties in the division of paid work. Furthermore, we find that these policies reduce the effect of relative resources in moderating changes in the division of labor after first birth. However, this moderating effect operates differently across policy measures, with contrasting implications for gender equality. While moderate-length maternal leave and greater childcare availability encourage more gender egalitarian divisions of paid work among couples where wives have low relative resources, long maternal leaves encourage more gender traditional divisions of labor among couples where wives have high relative resources. Together, these findings provide new, robust evidence in support of work-family policies’ role in shaping parenthood penalties within different-sex couples and provide novel insight into the mechanisms through which work-family policies increase – or decrease – gender inequality.

Authors

• Allison Dunatchik, University of South Carolina-Columbia

• Pilar Gonalons-Pons, University of Pennsylvania