Parenthood, Employment and the ‘Child Penalty’

1. Parenthood, Employment and the ‘Child Penalty’ Maureen Baker Dept of Sociology University of Auckland ma.baker@auckland.ac.nz 1 August 2013

2. Overview of Presentation • Introduction • Empirical research behind presentation • Findings: • Reproductive Decisions • Pregnancy, Children & Work-Related Concessions • Lone-Parenting & Paid Work • Conclusions

3. Introduction • Most men & women (93%) want to become parents • Reproduction ‘normal’ within committed relationship • Yet emotional & physical child care seldom shared evenly between men and women • After parenthood, fathers increase their paid work while mothers often reduce it while increasing caring work • But both parents are now expected to work for pay

4. ‘Child Penalty’ Research • Applicants or employees who are pregnant or mothers perceived as less qualified, less competent & less committed to job (Correll, Benard & Paik 2007) • Substantial earnings gap between mothers & childless women (esp with more children, longer employment leaves & professional jobs) • Motherhood penalty considerably larger than gender gap (Crittenden 2001, Zhang 2009) • Part-time work typically leads to few promotions or salary increases over the decades

5. Central Questions of Presentation • How do men & women view impact of children on paid work? • How does this vary by occupation & family circumstances? • What difference does sole parenthood make to employment ‘choices’?

6. Methodology • 174 interviews from 3 NZ studies (grouped to enlarge sample & identify patterns by social circumstances) • Study 1: 24 participants (11 couples + 2 individuals) trying to have children with assisted conception, 2002 • Study 2: 30 academics (18 females, 12 males) with doctorates & permanent university positions discussing gender, family & career, 2008 • Study 3: 120 DPB mothers expected to find paid work & become self-supporting by WINZ, 2001

7. 1. Reproductive Decisions • In 3 studies, reproduction viewed as desirable & normal but not always explicit decision • Decisions influenced by personal desires, availability of partners, partner’s wishes, occupational requirements & other pressures • In all 3 studies, women view childbearing as more consequential for employment than men do (but important to gender identity of both)

8. Importance of Parenthood for Gender Identity & Social Inclusion • “You definitely miss out on something [if you don’t have children] because a lot of my friends have got kids and … you gradually get further and further away”. (Professional, male, Fertility Study) • “I think I’ve got a lot of emotional space for children. I think I’m probably quite maternal. I want to have a child who I can experience the growing up, the processing, the giving, the kind of nurturing and as well as the difficult times.” (Professional, lesbian, Fertility Study)

9. Professional Constraints: Academics & Reproduction • “I love kids, it’s just that circumstances have meant that I’ve not had kids, but I’m sure that those circumstances have a lot to do with my choice of career… I hear these stories about how you have to coincide your pregnancies with the summer break (laughter) … and about the pressure if you have to make a decision to take time off to be a mum. Will you be able to pick up, will you be left behind?” (Lecturer, woman) • “I think I could never have imagined pursuing a career if I had had children … I could not have found time to bring up children… I think I probably would have liked at least one child if I’d had enough money to have a nanny but (laughter) not otherwise …” (Professor, woman)

10. Children & Academic Men • “I’ve been offered lots of (overseas) jobs but I can’t take them. It’s not an option….If I wasn’t married with kids, I would have left here 3 years ago”. (Father, SL) • “Well, I’ve had to realise that I can’t do things quite as fast as I used to… There’s a lot of goals I want to achieve and I know I will achieve them, but it won’t quite be necessarily on the time frame I had initially hoped… If I hadn’t had kids, I probably would be a Professor now [ironic small laugh]. (Father, AP)

11. More women talked about reducing paid work for children • “I said to my husband, even if we don't have children I don’t want to work for the rest of my life. Most women who have children give up work for, what, two years or something. All my friends don't work because they have children and they say, meet for coffee, and I can’t, so I feel I sometimes miss out that way.” (working class woman, Fertility Study) • “After going through fertility treatments, I wouldn't want to be apart. I'd want to be with the baby… My husband and I both feel very strongly that the first year I'll stay home”. (professional female, hopeful mother, Fertility Study)

12. Reducing Paid Work (cont’d) • “I know parenting is both of our responsibilities but as the mother, I feel the pull more than he does to be at home and be the main nurturer in our family”. (Female lecturer) • “I was very ambitious before, you know, very focused because if you don’t have a child, you don’t have that extra responsibility, so you can put all your energy into your job. When my daughter came along I found that I wanted to spend more time with her and it just wasn’t that important any more to climb the career ladder.” (Female lecturer)

13. Both Men & Women Report Challenges Combining Parenthood & Academic Work • “It’s not that you have x amount of time that you need to give over to being a parent and your parental duties, it’s the fragmented nature of that time, during the course of a day or a week, that I think poses a real challenge to maintaining your optimal productive potential as a scholar (Male lecturer) • “I know that before I had children and when I got tenure, I had a plan that I would be a full professor by about 2005 and that hasn’t happened.” (Male AP)

14. Women Report More Institutional Challenges • Female lecturer, discussing doctoral experiences in USA: • “To excel, you needed to be completely consumed by your studies on some level. And that just wasn’t possible for the married women because most of them, their partners were also working, they had a lot of child care responsibilities.” • “I found when I first came back to work (from maternity leave), I was scheduled to teach from 5 until 6 three days a week and the crèche closes at 5!”. (Female lecturer)

15. Sole Parenting Major Obstacle • The sole parents in the Academic Study were all women (men were all partnered) • “I meet all the family commitments and all the practical commitments by myself whereas other people would be able to share those commitments… My daughter’s sick, I’m the one to do it. There’s no shared responsibility there. If somebody needs to take time off that’s only me, you know – always… I couldn’t do this job and have two children and be a single parent. I’d need a wife.” (SL sole mother)

16. DPB Mothers & Paid Work • University graduate with 2 children, formerly with managerial job but now on DPB: • “I found it quite difficult to get a job after my boy went to school. I would go for a job and was over-qualified for everything. Nobody wants someone who had 50 staff… In actual fact, I had to take all my accomplishments out of my CV to even get a job… I pared it to the bare bones and looked for part-time work… I do enjoy the [current job] but I can do it blindfolded…and I am getting paid less.”

17. DPB Mothers (cont’d) • Many DPB mothers with school-aged children believed they couldn’t work full-time: • “I have a child who, when he is sick, I have to stay home. During the school holidays I have to stay home, as there is nobody to look after him. He has nobody but me.” (mother of asthmatic child) • “To me, my number one job is a mother and I don’t care what anyone says. If I legally don’t have to work until he is 14, then I won’t … He doesn’t have a dad or grandparents, and it’s only me and him …” (DPB mother, 1 child)

18. Summary • Most participants saw children as normal outcome of committed relationship, important to gender identity • Both men and women argued that children interfered with occupational promotion but only mothers believed parenthood merited extended leave from paid work or reduced working hours • Many DPB mothers believed that ‘good mothering’ required constant supervision or part-time work, and that paid work typically brought poor financial returns & childcare dilemmas

19. Summary (academic women…) • More likely than men to delay or avoid childbearing & have fewer children • Reported lack of institutional support for pregnancy, breastfeeding & childcare • Felt university priorities favoured academics without daily childcare responsibilities

20. Conclusion • Female participants • perceived greater care responsibilities (esp sole mothers) • reported more household obligations • made more work-related concessions • These concessions led to perceptions of lower work commitment by partners, co-workers & employers, & penalty in salary/rank • Interviews illustrate how ‘child penalty’ occurs in various circumstances (family, occupational & financial)

21. Implications of my Research • Importance of equal sharing of domestic work & childcare • Employees need paid parental leave, family-related leave, subsidised and employment-based childcare services • Employers and colleagues need to acknowledge the work involved in parenting, especially mothering • Many women could benefit from career mentoring (or at least knowledge of the outcomes of women’s typical work-related ‘choices’)