Women's and men’s career interruptions in Europe : the role of social policies1

Abstract

How do countries differ in the type and level of women's and men's labour-market participation around parenthood? What are the models of interruptions prevalent? What is their impact on subsequent participation and wages? How does this impact depend on duration, type and "gender" of interruptions? How such impact is connected to the different social policies offered? Drawing on existing comparative datasets and offering a synthesis of the main "facts" and arguments provided so far in the literature, this paper addresses these questions by looking both at women and men and at similarities and differences within enlarged Europe. It shows that there is clearly a cost to employment discontinuities, either for unemployment or family-care, in terms of current and future participation, career opportunities, and wages, and these costs are institutionally and culturally embedded. Costs for parenthood, which are still the highest and the most "gendered", are minimal in countries that spend more on families and, within such investment, that spend more on childcare services than on cash transfers. Moreover, they are lowest in countries where rights to leaves are individual-based, where fathers have paternity leaves or a specific reserved quota in the parental leaves, where wage compensation is high throughout the period, and where length is overall relatively short.

Educational differences in macro-level determinants of early exit from paid work: a multilevel analysis of 14 European countries

“…Previous studies also show that there are sex differences in retirement intentions and behaviours (Albertsen et al 2007;Dahl et al 2003) and in the effect of macroeconomic factors on retirement decisions (Axelrad and McNamara 2017;Shuey and O'Rand 2004). Older female workers, for example, may have to work longer to be entitled to the same benefits as men, because they are more likely to have had interruptions in their working careers (Musumeci and Solera 2013). Therefore, we will consider possible sex differences when examining determinants of early work exit.…”

The occupational integration of migrant women in Western European labour markets

“…In countries such as Italy and Spain, unemployment rates among immigrants are not much higher than those among natives, while the overwhelming majority of immigrants are employed at the bottom of the occupational ladder, mainly manual jobs in the secondary labour market (Bernardi et al, 2011;Reyneri and Fullin, 2011). Immigrant women are often pushed into the unskilled domestic care of elderly persons, because a family-based welfare regime devolved most of the care for the weak family members to the family and to the (often extra-legal) market (Musumeci and Solera, 2013).…”

Husbands and Wives

“…this is consistent with the findings of the research on the so-called 'work-life conflict' that the strain of reconciling work and family is strong not only among women but also among men, especially if they have high-level jobs or are self-employed. Men increasingly want to be involved fathers, but this seems to clash with the demands of their jobs and with the perception that they can only shed the image and the expectation of the 'unconditional worker' by incurring strong career penalties (McGinnity & Calvert, 2009;Musumeci & Solera, 2013).…”

“…By favouring or not favouring some possible courses of actions, they also define normative models. Various studies have shown, in fact, that the relative contribution of aQ4 men and fathers increases in the presence of 'good' policies such as a large provision of subsidized high-quality childcare services and fully paid parental leaves with a specific quota reserved for fathers (Fagan & Norman 2013;Musumeci & Solera, 2013;Smith & Williams 2007), but their success also depends on their specific configuration and on the discourse around them: if family policies are framed in terms of supporting fertility, as in France, more than supporting gender equality, as in Scandinavian countries, the gender division of labour is more traditional and the work-life stress is higher (Crompton, 2006;pfau-effinger, 2005).…”

“…aQ14 please provide name of publisher in reference " Gerson (1985)." aQ15 please provide name and location of publisher of the cited book chapter in reference " Musumeci and Solera (2013)." aQ16 please provide page number in reference " Musumeci et al (2014)".…”