TY - JOUR A1 - Bünning, Mareike A1 - Hipp, Lena T1 - How can we become more equal? BT - public policies and parents’ work–family preferences in Germany JF - Journal of European social policy N2 - This study examines how public policies affect parents' preferences for a more egalitarian division of paid and unpaid work. Based on the assumption that individuals develop their preferences within a specific policy context, we examine how changes in three policies affect mothers' and fathers' work-family preferences: the availability of high-quality, affordable childcare; the right to return to a full-time job after having reduced hours to part-time and an increase in the number of 'partner months' in parental leave schemes. Analysing a unique probability sample of parents with young children in Germany from 2015 (N = 1756), we find that fathers would want to work slightly fewer hours if they had the right to return to a full-time position after working part-time, and mothers would want to work slightly more hours if childcare opportunities were improved. Full-time working parents, moreover, are found to prefer fewer hours independent of the policy setting, while non-employed parents would like to work at least some hours. Last but not least, our analyses show that increasing the number of partner months in the parental leave scheme considerably increases fathers' preferences for longer and mothers' preferences for shorter leave. Increasing the number of partner months in parental schemes hence has the greatest potential to increase gender equality. KW - work-family policies KW - parental leave KW - childcare KW - working time KW - regulations KW - parenthood KW - working hours KW - gender equality KW - preferences KW - capabilities framework Y1 - 2021 U6 - https://doi.org/10.1177/09589287211035701 SN - 0958-9287 SN - 1461-7269 VL - 32 IS - 2 SP - 182 EP - 196 PB - Sage Publ. CY - London ER - TY - CHAP A1 - Hipp, Lena A1 - Schlüter, Charlotte A1 - Molina, Stefania ED - Dobrotić, Ivana ED - Blum, Sonja ED - Koslowski, Alison T1 - The role of employers in reducing the implementation gap in leave policies T2 - Research handbook on leave policy N2 - Although mothers and fathers in almost all rich democracies are entitled to some form of paid parenting leave, fathers in particular do not take all the leave available to them. As employers play an important role in the implementation of parenting leave policies, this chapter investigates which workplace characteristics influence mothers' and fathers' uptake of their statutory leave entitlements. In Part 1, we estimate the size of the gap between statutory leave entitlement and leave uptake across genders and countries by combining data from the OECD and the European Labor Force Survey. In Parts 2 and 3, we review the literature on structural, cultural, and normative explanations for the gap in parenting leave uptake. We conclude the chapter with suggestions for further research, including the need for reliable data on the size of the implementation gap and research on non-European countries. KW - parental leave KW - policy implementation KW - employment KW - workplace culture KW - gender equality Y1 - 2022 SN - 978-1-80037-221-4 SN - 978-1-80037-220-7 U6 - https://doi.org/10.4337/9781800372214.00036 SP - 338 EP - 352 PB - Edward Elgar Publishing CY - Cheltenham, UK ER - TY - RPRT A1 - Frodermann, Corinna A1 - Wrohlich, Katharina A1 - Zucco, Aline T1 - Parental Leave Reform and Long-run Earnings of Mothers T2 - CEPA Discussion Papers N2 - Paid parental leave schemes have been shown to increase women’s employment rates but decrease their wages in case of extended leave durations. In view of these potential trade-offs, many countries are discussing the optimal design of parental leave policies. We analyze the impact of a major parental leave reform on mothers’ long-term earnings. The 2007 German parental leave reform replaced a means-tested benefit with a more generous earnings-related benefit that is granted for a shorter period of time. Additionally, a “daddy quota” of two months was introduced. To identify the causal effect of this policy on long-run earnings of mothers, we use a difference-in-difference approach that compares labor market outcomes of mothers who gave birth just before and right after the reform and nets out seasonal effects by including the year before. Using administrative social security data, we confirm previous findings and show that the average duration of employment interruptions increased for high-income mothers. Nevertheless, we find a positive long-run effect on earnings for mothers in this group. This effect cannot be explained by changes in working hours, observed characteristics, changes in employer stability or fertility patterns. Descriptive evidence suggests that the stronger involvement of fathers, incentivized by the “daddy months”, could have facilitated mothers’ re-entry into the labor market and thereby increased earnings. For mothers with low prior-to-birth earnings, however, we do not find any beneficial labor market effects of this parental leave reform. T3 - CEPA Discussion Papers - 16 KW - parental leave KW - wages KW - labor supply Y1 - 2020 U6 - http://nbn-resolving.de/urn/resolver.pl?urn:nbn:de:kobv:517-opus4-443188 SN - 2628-653X IS - 16 ER -