Realities and Ideals: Flexible Work Arrangements in the Post-COVID Era

• In Event: 20814 - Workplace Support, Gender Norms, and Work-Family Balance in Policy and Practice

Abstract

To date, the majority of academic research on flexible work during and after the pandemic has concerned prevalence, focusing on a single aspect of flexibility–namely, work-from-home (or flexplace arrangements).This paper utilizes original data collected via a population-based survey of U.S. workers to ask to what extent workers are able to work flexibly, do work flexibly, and desire to work flexibly—with respect to both place and time—also known as flexplace and flextime arrangements. In addition, we ask how workers’ ideal work arrangements compare to reality and if some groups are more likely than others to fulfill their flexibility preferences. Data collection is currently underway, however, preliminary results (N = 1,115) indicate that most workers prefer hybrid work-from-home arrangements and most workers want to conduct a larger share of their work remotely than they do. Women and mothers spend a larger proportion of their time working remotely and desire to work remotely more; men and fathers spend smaller proportions of their time working from home and desire to work from home the least. Compared to other demographic groups, women and mothers also have the largest current-ideal flexplace gaps. With respect to flextime, workers have even less flexibility, although there is less of a mismatch between their actual and desired arrangements. Nevertheless, mothers, fathers of young kids, women, and parents of young kids would like to complete a larger share of their work during non-standard hours than they currently do. Conversely, men, fathers, and mothers of young kids would prefer to complete larger shares of work during standard, business hours.

Authors

• Christin L. Munsch, University of Connecticut

• Tessa Holtzman, Stanford University