A Father’s Day wake-up call
Taking time off to raise children is often cited as one reason for the gender wage gap between men and women. The argument is that when mothers suspend their careers they lose traction in the workplace and return to lower wages. And because women are more likely than men to take time off for family reasons, this contributes to the gross gender earnings gap. Well, it turns out fathers who take a large role in child raising may pay the same price—with important implications for our nation’s future economic growth, something we should consider this Father’s Day weekend.
Recent research finds that fathers pay an economic penalty for taking time off for family just as mothers do. Sociologists Scott Coltrane, Elizabeth Miller, Tracy DeHaan, and Lauren Stewart, all of the University of Oregon, looked at what happens to the long-term earnings of men and women who take time off. Their work finds the familiar result that women see a reduction in long-term earnings after taking time off for family reasons. What they also find is that men see a reduction in earnings as well.
Importantly, they find no statistical difference between the size of the earnings decrease for men and women. What’s more, they discover that differences in earnings reduction depend on whether work reductions are family or non-family related. Both men and women who leave the workforce for nonfamily reasons actually see their earnings go down less than workers who leave for family reasons. The average reduction for nonfamily reasons was about 5 percent for men and 2 percent for women. But the penalty for leaving for family reasons was about 26 percent decrease for men and 23 percent for women.
These results are startling. Workers are actually penalized more for taking time off to help their families than for other reasons. This fact seems even more perverse in light of family decisions about whether to take time off to be with a new child. As Coltrane describes in a column for The Atlantic, increasing fathers’ participation in child rearing would be positive for kids, fathers, and mothers. Furthermore, if policymakers are interesting in developing future human capital, we should encourage parents to be with their children from an early age. Research shows how important the first few years of a child’s life are for their future prospects.
Family-friendly policies are often presented as policies designed to help the economic fortunes of mothers and female workers. The findings may also carry weight in the overall gender gap debate. After all, if U.S. workplaces punish fathers and mothers equally for raising children, then this particular explanation for a portion of the gender wage gap may become less plausible. But the work needed to make the modern workplace fit with the modern family will require the full involvement of fathers and men.