Based on a review of European national online surveys during the Covid lockdowns, this Policy Brief shows that in all the places, during lockdowns parents had to cope with a massive amount of unpaid workload in their homes which came in addition to their usual activities, including paid jobs. In the vast majority of the cases, the additional workload was divided unequally between men and women with women taking the lion’s share, almost irrespective if they carried on working in their main job or not. One cannot overestimate the burden that mothers carry when schools and childcare institutions are closed. Considering the length of school closures in many European countries so far, and the unfortunate tendency of introducing further school closures, there is a risk of long-term negative consequences both on the wellbeing and the labour market prospects of these women. Household burdens might well be important factors explaining a large part of the gender gap in well-being identified in several early Covid-19 study . It is however also important to acknowledge, that many men also took up a significant amount of work at home. More than ever, attention thus needs to be paid not only to the gender gap but also to the increasing time-availability gap as well as possible well-being gap between parents and non-parents.

BLASKO Zsuzsa;  SANJUAN BELDA Jordi; 

2022-06-13

European Commission

JRC128157

https://publications.jrc.ec.europa.eu/repository/handle/JRC128157,