Hostname: page-component-586b7cd67f-dsjbd Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-11-25T02:53:10.872Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

Combining Employment with Childcare: An Escape From Dependence?

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  20 January 2009

Clare Ward ,
Angela Dale  and
Heather Joshi
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Abstract

The availability of childcare is an important factor in enabling motherhood to be combined with paid employment. This article uses evidence from the fifth sweep of the National Child Development Study to analyse the use of childcare by a cohort of employed women who were aged 33 in 1991. There is a heavy reliance on informal care by women in partnerships and also by lone mothers. Formal care is most heavily used by women whose youngest child is under five, especially if the woman works full-time. Reported costs of childcare represent nearly a quarter of net weekly earnings for mothers with a child under five. Formal childcare is shown to play an important role in facilitating women's full-time employment. Full-time employment is the route by which women achieve financial independence from their partner. It also increases the likelihood of contributing to an occupational pension which, in turn, has implications for financial independence in later life. However, the majority of women in this cohort do not take the full-time route. For these women, low earnings potential and part-time working make paid childcare uneconomic and reinforces both their role as minor financial contributors within the family and their lack of pension provision in later life.

Type
Articles
Information
Journal of Social Policy , Volume 25 , Issue 2 , April 1996 , pp. 223 - 247
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 1996

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

REFERENCES

Bradshaw, J. and Millar, J. (1991), Lone Parent Families in the UK, HMSO, London.Google Scholar
Brannen, J. and Moss, P. (1991), Managing Mothers: dual earner households after maternity leave, Unwin Hyman, London.Google Scholar
Burchell, B., Dale, A. and Joshi, H. (forthcoming 1996), ‘Part-time working among British women’, in Blossfeld, H. P. and Hakim, C. (eds.), Between equalisation and marginalisation: part-time working women in Europe and in the United States, Oxford University Press, Oxford.Google Scholar
Cohen, B. and Fraser, N. (1991), Childcare in a Modern Welfare System: towards a new national policy, Institute for Public Policy Research, London.Google Scholar
Dale, A. and Joshi, H. (1992), ‘The economic and social status of British women’, Acta Demographica, Physical Verlag, Heidelberg, pp. 27–46.Google Scholar
Davies, H. and Joshi, H. (1993), ‘Mother's human capital and childcare in Britain’, National Institute Economic Review, 93/4, 146: 50–63.Google Scholar
Ferri, E. (1992), What Makes Childminding Work? A study of the training of childminders. National Children's Bureau, London.Google Scholar
Ferri, E. (1993), Life at 33: The fifth follow up of the National Child Development Study, National Children's Bureau, City University and the ESRC, London.Google Scholar
Greater Manchester Low Pay Unit (1994). ‘Lone parents and the child care allowance’, The Bottom Line, Newsletter, Summer issue pp. 9–10.Google Scholar
Holtermann, S. (1992), Investing in Young Children: costing an education and day care service, National Children's Bureau, London.Google Scholar
Holtermann, S. (1993), Becoming a Breadwinner: policies to assist lone parents with childcare, Daycare Trust, London.Google Scholar
Joshi, H. (1990), ‘Obstacles and opportunities for lone parents as breadwinners in Great Britain’, in Duskin, E. (ed.), Lone Parent Families: the economic challenge, OECD, Paris, pp. 127–50.Google Scholar
Joshi, H. (1994), ‘Marriage, motherhood and old age security’, in Maclean, M. (ed.), The Family, Politics and the Law, Oxford University Press, Oxford (in press).Google Scholar
Joshi, H. and Davies, H. (1992), ‘Daycare in Europe and mothers' foregone earnings’, International Labour Review, 131, 6: 561–79.Google Scholar
Joshi, H. and Davies, H. (1994), ‘The paid and unpaid roles of women: how should Social Security adapt?’ In Baldwin, S. and Falkingham, J. (eds.), Social Security: New challenges to the Beveridge Model, Harvester Wheatsheaf, Hemel Hempstead, pp 234–54.Google Scholar
McRae, S. (1993), ‘Returning to work after childbirth: opportunities and inequalities’, European Sociological Review, 9, 2: 125–37.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Marsh, A. and McKay, S. (1993), ‘Families, work and the use of childcare’, Employment Gazette, August 1993, pp. 361–9.Google Scholar
Martin, J. and Roberts, C. (1984), Women and Employment: a lifetime perspective, HMSO, London.Google Scholar
Meltzer, H. (1994), Day Care Services for Children, a survey carried out on behalf of the Department of Health in 1990, OPCS Social Survey Division, HMSO, London.Google Scholar
Metcalf, H. and Leighton, P. (1989), The Under-utilisation of Women in the Labour Market, IMS Report No. 172, IMS, Brighton.Google Scholar
Moss, P. (1988), Childcare and Equality of Opportunity, Commission of the European Communities, Brussels.Google Scholar
Paci, P., Joshi, H. and Makepeace, G. (1994), Paygaps Facing Men and Women Born in 1958: Differences within the labour market. Paper for Economics of Equal Opportunities Seminar, SSRU, City University.Google Scholar
Pond, C. (1989), ‘The changing distribution of income, wealth and poverty’, in Hamnett, C., McDowell, L. and Sarre, P. (eds.), The Changing Social Structure, Sage, London.Google Scholar
Rose, D. and Lauri, H. (1991), ‘Household allocative systems, gender and class analysis’, Working papers of the ESRC Research Centre on Micro-social Change, paper 6, University of Essex, Colchester.Google Scholar
Stark, T. (1988), New A—Z of Income and Wealth, Fabian Society, London.Google Scholar
Ward, C. (1993), ‘Family income’, in Ferri, E. (ed.), Life at 33: Findings from the fifth sweep of the National Child Development Study, ESRC/National Children's Bureau, London.Google Scholar
Ward, C., Dale, A. and Joshi, H. (1993), ‘Participation in the labour market’, in Ferri, E. (ed.), Life at 33: Findings from the fifth sweep of the National Child Development Study, ESRC/National Children's Bureau, London.Google Scholar
Ward, C., Joshi, H. and Dale, A. (1993), Income Dependence within Couples. National Child Development Study working paper 36, Social Statistics Research Unit. City University, London.Google Scholar
Witherspoon, S. and Prior, G. (1991), ‘Working mothers: free to choose?’, in Jowell, R. (ed.), British Social Attitudes the 8th report, Dartmouth, London, pp. 131–54.Google Scholar