Mums find the right balance with part-time work
It’s a common assumption that mums would choose to work more hours if they could find childcare for their kids but a new study reveals a different picture.
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Many women with children are happy to work part-time so they can be home with their kids, a new study has found.
Researchers studied underemployment in a sample of nearly 5000 Australian women and found those with children under 15 are not likely to want to work more hours.
The study, published by the Life Course Centre from the University of Queensland, found mothers with children 15 years old and younger have lower underemployment levels than women with no children.
It goes against a popular assumption that mothers would work more hours if they could balance it with caring for children.
Lead author Parvinder Kler found younger women, women without tertiary qualifications and those with no kids at home were 50 per cent more likely to want more hours of work.
“The rate of underemployment for younger females in part-time employment falls when they have young children, as they are more likely to be satisfied with working restricted hours given the need of young children to have additional supervision in the home,” Dr Kler, from Griffith University, said.
“Females prioritise their offspring upbringing and hence choose to seek employment opportunities with limited hours so they can be more readily available during their children’s vital formative years,” she said.
The findings come as women make up 47 per cent of the workforce overall but 68 per cent of those who work part time. Data from the Australian Institute of Family Studies shows mothers work on average 20 hours a week in paid employment.
Those most at risk of being underemployed, which is defined as failure to secure the working hours they want, are young women who have done a degree but have not yet started a family.
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By the time women age, the presence of children has no bearing on their underemployment status. Dr Kler said it was “due to older females’ children being more mature in age, on average, thereby freeing their mothers’ time for working”.
Mentone mother-of-two Nataly Tormey, 34, became a mother at 23 and a single parent soon after. “I didn’t have any choice but to make sure my work fitted around being a parent,” she said.
She started the Parentmedic Movement giving parents first aid training and Harry Helper, a program giving kids emotional, mental and physical skills to help others.