Gender Inequality Reinforced: The Impact of a Child’s Health Shock on Parents’ Labor Market Trajectories

This article employs a couple-level framework to examine how a child’s severe illness affects within-family gender inequality. We study parental labor market responses to a child’s cancer diagnosis by exploiting an event-study methodology and rich individual-level administrative data on hospitalizations and labor market variables for the total population in Finland. We find that a child’s cancer negatively affects the mother’s and the father’s labor income. The effect is considerably larger for women, increasing gender inequality beyond the well-documented motherhood penalty. We test three potential moderators explaining the more negative outcomes among mothers: (1) breadwinner status, (2) adherence to traditional gender roles and conservative values, and (3) the child’s care needs. We find that mothers who are the main breadwinner experience a smaller reduction in their household income contribution than other mothers. Additionally, working in a gender-typical industry and a child’s augmented care needs reinforce mothers’ gendered responses. These findings contribute to the literature by providing new insights into gender roles when a child falls ill and demonstrating the effects of child health on gender inequality in two-parent households.

Sophia Mulholland Sophia Mulholland
Oct 26, 2023 - 21:30 Updated: Oct 30, 2023 - 17:44
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Gender Inequality Reinforced: The Impact of a Child’s Health Shock on Parents’ Labor Market Trajectories

Gender Inequality Reinforced: The Impact of a

Child’s Health Shock on Parents’ Labor Market

Trajectories

Maria Vaalavuo, Henri Salokangas, Ossi Tahvonen
Demography, Vol. 60, No. 4 (August 2023), pp. 1005-1029 (25 pages)

ABSTRACT

This article employs a couple-level framework to examine how a child’s severe illness affects within-family gender inequality. We study parental labor market responses to a child’s cancer diagnosis by exploiting an event-study methodology and rich individual-level administrative data on hospitalizations and labor market variables for the total population in Finland. We find that a child’s cancer negatively affects the mother’s and the father’s labor income. The effect is considerably larger for women, increasing gender inequality beyond the well-documented motherhood penalty. We test three potential moderators explaining the more negative outcomes among mothers: (1) breadwinner status, (2) adherence to traditional gender roles and conservative values, and (3) the child’s care needs. We find that mothers who are the main bread winner experience a smaller reduction in their household income contribution than other mothers. Additionally, working in a gender-typical industry and a child’s augmented care needs reinforce mothers’ gendered responses. These findings contribute to the literature by providing new insights into gender roles when a child falls ill and demonstrating the effects of child health on gender inequality in two-parent households.
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