Beruflich Dokumente
Kultur Dokumente
10.1177/0192513X04270344
Galtry, Callister
OF FAMILY
/ ASSESSING
ISSUES
PARENTAL
/ March 2005
LEAVE
Judith Galtry
Paul Callister
Victoria University
Parental leave is a complex area of public policy. Concerns include health protection for
working mothers, equal employment opportunities for women, access to adequate antenatal
and birthing care, maternal recovery, optimal nutrition for infants, and gender equality within
families. Given this complexity, the design of parental leave schemes, including the optimal
length of leave, should ideally be based on research from a wide range of disciplines. Yet re-
search literature generally focuses on single issues. In this article, the focus is widened to en-
compass mothers’ labor market outcomes, concerns surrounding childbirth and maternal re-
covery, parent-infant bonding, children’s cognitive development, breastfeeding, and
associated with each of these, gender equity objectives. In light of information from a wide
range of disciplines and based on two country models, Sweden and the United States, it is
proposed that discussions about parental leave policy, including the appropriate length of
leave, should take a broad, interdisciplinary perspective.
Authors’ Note: This study was supported by a grant from the Alfred P. Sloan Foundation
while the authors were working at the Cornell Employment and Family Careers Institute,
Cornell University, N.Y. We would like to thank Professor Phyllis Moen for her support.
Parents potentially confront these costs whether or not they have the
right to return to their job. However, some of the costs outlined above are
more applicable to individuals in career-type occupations rather than to
those in “dead-end” jobs. For example, some jobs have little or no on-the-
job training, and employers may not necessarily expect contingent work-
ers to have high levels of commitment. By contrast, for managers and pro-
fessionals, signaling high commitment and loyalty to the company may be
very important.
If those parents taking “time out” do not have a guaranteed right to job
protection, they potentially face further costs. These include the costs of
job searches and possible unintended unemployment when wishing to re-
enter the labor force and loss of work-related benefits, such as subsidized
health care, retirement income, and length of service-related benefits.
The costs of undertaking unpaid caring work are well-documented
(e.g., Folbre, 1994, 2001; Institute for Women’s Policy Research, 2000;
National Alliance for Caregiving and National Center on Women and Ag-
ing, 1999; Wisensale, 2001). However, these costs tend to vary between
countries. In those nations with well-developed and publicly funded
222 JOURNAL OF FAMILY ISSUES / March 2005
health care systems, such as Sweden, a period of time out from employ-
ment will not reduce access to health care in the same way that it often
does in the United States. Nor will loss of household income be as great in
those countries that have paid parental leave. Whereas it is difficult to de-
termine any causal relationship between the generosity of parental leave
schemes and the length of leave taken, certainly in the United States the
lack of taxpayer-funded payment is associated with the uptake of rela-
tively short leaves. In Sweden in 1995, 98% of mothers and 18% of fathers
took 60 or more days of parental leave (Swedish National Social Insur-
ance Board, 2001).2 In contrast, in the United States when asked about
length of longest leave by reason for leave, only 29% of respondents to the
Department of Labor’s 2000 FMLA survey reported taking more than 60
days for maternity or disability leave, whereas 10% reported taking a sim-
ilar period of leave to care for a newborn, adopted, or foster child (U.S.
Department of Labor, 2000). This research also suggests that many
American parents would take more leave if they received financial
support.
Even in countries where leave is paid, there is some concern that long-
term earnings are potentially reduced if leave periods are extended. There
is a wide range of international literature quantifying the long-term costs
of time out of paid work, particularly for women. Much of this research
draws either directly or indirectly on human capital theory. Central to
these understandings is the concept that tenure in paid work has a major
impact on earnings. Examples of links between time spent in work and
earnings have been found in a number of countries. For example, in the
United States Shapiro and Mott (1994) found that wage premiums are
substantially higher for women who are strongly attached to the labor
force than for those with relatively weak labor market links. Using British
longitudinal data, Waldfogel (1995) found a large wage premium associ-
ated with the use of maternity leave and return to work relative to quitting
work. This finding is supported by subsequent research in both Britain
and the United States (Joshi, Paci, & Waldfogel, 1999; Waldfogel, 1998).
Ruhm (1998a), analyzing the economic consequences of paid parental
leave in nine European countries between 1969 and 1993, notes that pa-
rental leave is associated with increases in women’s employment but re-
ductions in women’s relative wages in those contexts where long-term
leaves are common. In Sweden, Stafford and Sundström (1994) also mea-
sured the effects of time out of the labor force because of the birth of a
child. They suggest that although there are significant costs associated
with taking time out of paid work in Sweden, long-term earnings tend to
recover. They also found that the costs were particularly high for men. Ac-
Galtry, Callister / ASSESSING PARENTAL LEAVE 223
cording to Stafford and Sundström, some of the costs of time out of the
workforce for men are attributable to “signaling” effects, namely, the per-
ception that such men are less committed to their careers. They also ob-
serve that in the United States there is a particularly high career cost asso-
ciated with time out to care for children. One explanation might be that in
countries with a high level of income inequality, such as the United States,
a period of time out of the workplace can be particularly expensive if,
through signaling lowered commitment, it serves to slow promotion (Bell
& Freeman, 2001). It is also likely that social norms play a role in deter-
mining the cost of time out of paid work. But social norms do not neces-
sarily operate independently of economic incentives. Sweden is an exam-
ple of a country in which there is strong financial reinforcement for
parents to take time out following childbirth.
Although research establishes that a long-term attachment to the labor
force offers significant advantages for many workers in terms of lifetime
earnings, this does not mean that taking a period of leave inevitably harms
labor market prospects. There is clearly much variation in the effects on
various groups and individuals of taking time out of paid work. These ef-
fects are dependent on factors such as levels of formal education, prior
work experience and employment patterns following the birth of a child,
occupational status, length of leave, the number of leaves taken over a life
cycle, and employer attitudes. For parents with a pattern of intermittent at-
tachment to the labor market, the costs of additional time out in terms of
income growth are likely to be relatively low, even nil. The behavior of a
parent following the period of leave can be just as important as the length
of leave taken. For example, after a short period of leave, a full-time
worker may undertake reduced weekly hours of paid work. This could
have a greater effect on his or her long-term earnings than taking a longer
period of leave followed by a return to full-time employment. The benefits
of remaining “attached” to one employer also depend on the state of the la-
bor market. In a period of full employment, re-entry into paid work may
be relatively easy for some groups of workers. In addition, the cost of time
out to mothers is not only dependent on their own behavior, but it is also
determined by the behavior of both women and men who take no leave
around childbirth and of individuals without children. Below-replacement
fertility rates in most industrialized countries indicate that a significant
proportion of women (and men) are no longer having children.
In Nordic countries, there has been much emphasis on encouraging fa-
thers to increase their uptake of parental leave. These efforts recognize the
advantages to both children and fathers themselves of the latter’s involve-
ment in child rearing, the potential costs to women associated with their
224 JOURNAL OF FAMILY ISSUES / March 2005
disproportionate uptake of leave, and the right, and indeed the responsibil-
ity, of men to be fully involved fathers (Carlsen, 1998; European Commis-
sion, 1994). In Sweden, encouraging men to take leave has been shown to
have direct positive effects for women. For instance, Haas and Hwang
(1999) report that mothers experience less of a decline in income from
prechildbirth levels if their partners take a greater-than-average share of
family leave entitlement.
Finally, although not generally discussed in the parental leave litera-
ture, the number of times an individual takes leave may be just as impor-
tant as the length of each leave. For example, the effect on a parent’s career
of taking a 12-month leave period for one child may be far less than a par-
ent of four children taking four periods of 6 months’ leave.
In a review of the labor market literature, Blau, Ferber, and Winkler
(2001) conclude that if parents demonstrate a strong labor market attach-
ment prior to having children, a relatively short leave with a return to the
same employer and to the same work pattern is likely to result in low or
negligible lifetime earning costs. Generally, a short leave is determined to
be around 3 months and a long leave 9 months or more (Ruhm, 1998a).
Where individuals already exhibit a weak attachment to the labor force,
additional time out is likely to have little impact on their income growth.
By contrast, if there is no paid leave available, the actual loss of income
while out of the labor force is very important for this group (Callister,
2002). Payment potentially allows a much larger group to take time out of
work and to use longer periods of leave. It also signifies recognition by so-
ciety that some parents might underinvest in leave if relying on their own
financial resources. Therefore, in those situations where parents are to-
tally dependent on their own financial means, the optimal length of paren-
tal leave may be quite different than what appears to be “best practice”
based on medical and other research.
PREGNANCY, CHILDBIRTH,
AND MATERNAL RECOVERY
actual and preferred role. Women who stay at home for extended periods
but are concerned about role restrictions are at risk of depression.
Finally, the benefits of time out of work to undertake a period of breast-
feeding have traditionally been viewed, at least in many industrialized
countries, as primarily accruing to the child (see next section). There is in-
creasing evidence, however, of physiological and emotional benefits to
mothers associated with breastfeeding. These include possible protective
effects against breast cancer in premenopausal women (Newcomb et al.,
1994), ovarian cancer (Gwinn, Lee, Rhodes, Layde, & Rubin, 1990;
Hartge et al., 1989), and osteoporosis (Blaauw et al., 1994). One study
also suggests that women who have been breastfed as infants have less
chance of developing breast cancer in later life (Freudenheim et al., 1994).
In relation to paid employment, both mothers and fathers or other partners
may benefit from a breastfed child, as there is some indication that breast-
fed babies are less likely to become ill and thus be excluded from child
care (Jones & Matheny, 1993). It is, however, difficult to determine from
these studies the optimal duration of breastfeeding, including whether it is
exclusive or partial, in terms of providing these benefits to mothers. Re-
cent research on the association between breastfeeding and breast cancer
nevertheless concludes that longer breastfeeding duration is strongly as-
sociated with reduced risk of breast cancer, having implications for
women in developed countries, such as the United States (Collaborative
Group on Hormonal Factors in Breast Cancer, 2002). Breastfeeding also
offers mothers a range of other less easily quantifiable advantages in terms
of their own well-being and self-esteem, as well as enhanced bonding
with their offspring (Labbok, 2001).
Overall, the literature on pregnancy, childbirth, and maternal recovery
suggests that optimal leave duration will vary according to a wide range of
factors, including the relative ease or difficulty of the individual’s preg-
nancy and childbirth. However, there is some indication that the optimal
length of leave is likely to be in the order of months rather than weeks or
days, particularly postbirth.
BREASTFEEDING
feed and for longer periods than those in full-time work. Lindberg also
found that women are more likely to stop breastfeeding in the month they
enter employment, suggesting that these behaviors constrain each other.
She concluded that for women to achieve the recommended 6 months of
breastfeeding would require maternity leaves of at least 6 months.
In his 16-country study, Ruhm (2000b) observed that whereas there is a
range of mechanisms by which parental leave may benefit child health,
generous maternity/parental leave policies may mean that women breast-
feed their offspring for longer periods. According to Ruhm, although it is
difficult to establish the exact effect of breastfeeding, based on previous
studies “a reasonable guess is that a substantial parental leave entitlement
might increase breastfeeding sufficiently to prevent 0.5 to 1.0
postneonatal deaths per 1000 live births” (p. 952).
For mothers who wish to resume employment soon after childbirth or
for those in countries without generous and widely accessible periods of
leave, one alternative to taking a long period of leave to breastfeed is to ex-
press breastmilk (either by hand or breastpump) in the workplace. Fre-
quent feeding or expression is critical for ensuring milk production; if a
mother is unable to breastfeed or express/pump milk regularly, her supply
will gradually diminish, often resulting in early termination of breastfeed-
ing (Auerbach, 1999). If she has access to lactation breaks and facilities in
the workplace, the mother may be able to resume employment and express
and/or pump milk with relative ease. This may also represent a gender eq-
uity strategy for many families not only by enabling breastfeeding moth-
ers to return to work earlier but also by introducing the possibility of fa-
thers and other partners taking leave to bond with their infants. It is
noteworthy that there is no established body of research on the effective-
ness of breastmilk expression as a long-term strategy, including for
exclusive breastfeeding.
In general, the sooner a woman returns to work following childbirth,
the more frequently she will need to express milk. This is because it takes
several weeks for a good milk supply to become established. For instance,
a study examining the experiences of American mothers found that
women who return to paid employment after 16 weeks “often may have a
well-established milk supply, and may have successfully negotiated one
or more transient breastfeeding crises, thereby minimizing the potentially
negative effects that employment can have on breastfeeding” (Auerbach
& Guss, 1984, p. 960). 4
From the perspective of breastfeeding then, it would appear that the op-
timal length of postbirth maternity leave is at least 6 months. This, in com-
bination with workplace nursing breaks and facilities for 12 months,
230 JOURNAL OF FAMILY ISSUES / March 2005
For both mothers and fathers, one of the benefits of having a period of
time off work after the birth of a child is the increased potential for infant-
parent bonding. Although the term “bonding” is often used interchange-
ably with “attachment,” bonding generally refers to the newborn period,
whereas attachment refers to a longer period of infancy. In an influential
but subsequently much contested study, Bowlby (1952) studied children
confined to institutions. Bowlby found that in many cases, these infants
displayed inadequate emotional and personality development. He attrib-
uted this, controversially, to “maternal deprivation.” Similarly, Ainsworth
(1967) claimed an association between the security of infant attachment
and aspects of maternal care giving. Based on research in Uganda and
later in Baltimore, Maryland, Ainsworth observed that distinct patterns of
attachment evolve between infants and their mothers in the early years of
life. She suggested that the nature of the maternal-infant relationship re-
lated to the level of responsiveness demonstrated by the mother to her
newborn. According to Ainsworth, those mothers who responded more
quickly to their infants’ cries at 3 months were more likely to have
developed secure maternal-child attachments by 1 year.
In the 1970s, Klaus and Kennell suggested that a “sensitive period” ex-
isted during the first few hours of life. The baby’s emotional development
was seen as heavily reliant on close emotional contact with the mother,
Galtry, Callister / ASSESSING PARENTAL LEAVE 231
and the bonding process was often related to the mother’s hormonal pro-
cesses (Klaus & Kennell, 1976). However, studies that linked child devel-
opment and well-being primarily to the immediate postbirth period and/or
to the mother’s presence came to be seen as increasingly controversial by
child development researchers. Among this group were those who wished
to assert the importance of both biological parents to the child’s develop-
ment, as well as those who felt that previous research had often been moti-
vated by, and had resulted in, a form of mother blame. Other researchers
pointed out that whereas the prevailing perception of “good development”
predicated on mother-child inseparability had come to be regarded as a
universal, ahistorical truth, it failed to take into account the specificities of
diverse family types and employment arrangements. For instance, Lamb
(1976) argued that fathers had been neglected, historically, in child devel-
opment and attachment studies. In addition, many feminist writers criti-
cized earlier accounts for the way in which they made many mothers feel
guilty, in particular those who had not had the opportunity to bond or had
not bonded with their offspring in the manner prescribed by the “experts”
(see Hrdy, 1999).
Later research generally emphasized the importance of viewing bond-
ing more as a complex and enduring process “influenced by the parents’
perceptions of their infant, the reward value of the interactions, and even
social and economic situations that may or may not complicate the par-
ents’ lives” (Harris, 1993, p. 294). This was accompanied by the growing
realization that parent-child attachments do not always occur immediately
at birth but are more likely to be part of a gradually evolving and enduring
process that is mutually influenced through “a process of familiarization
and reciprocal interactions” (Harris, 1993, p. 293).
Despite a greater focus on bonding than on issues of child health more
generally in the parental leave research literature (McGovern et al., 1992),
research on child development offers little guidance regarding the exact
time required to make such a bond. However, in contrast to many other
fields, such as those concerning health and labor markets, where delibera-
tions about the effects on women and children of different policies and
practices are more confined within specific disciplinary boundaries, dis-
cussions about bonding have become part of popular discourse in recent
years. Concerns surrounding appropriate bonding times are thus the sub-
ject of much public and often highly charged debate. Moreover, bonding
is a far more difficult phenomenon to test empirically than, for instance,
the effects of lost wages related to time out of work or infant mortality
rates.
232 JOURNAL OF FAMILY ISSUES / March 2005
that a relatively short period of paid leave with a guarantee of job reinstate-
ment is preferable in terms of women’s economic and employment inter-
ests. Aside from lack of payment, the United States model of a short leave
period appears to fit this model.
Whereas leave policies vary among different states, at the federal level
only 3 months of unpaid leave is available under the 1993 FMLA. More-
over, due to strict eligibility criteria, many parents are not covered by the
FMLA (Callister, 2002). As of the end of 2002, the United States was,
along with Australia, one of only two industrialized countries without
paid leave.
Despite its apparent fit with research supporting a short period of leave
for women’s economic well-being, 12 weeks does not appear to be suffi-
cient either to protect children’s health or, in many cases, to promote opti-
mal maternal well-being following childbirth. Although welfare provi-
sion is not the specific subject of this article, sociocultural ideologies
about appropriate leave periods and parental time input for newborns and
infants are also likely to have implications for welfare measures. For in-
stance, in 1996, 3 years after the FMLA’s enactment, the United States
Congress enacted the Personal Responsibility and Work Opportunities
Reconciliation Act. This legislation requires that low-income mothers
seek and accept employment from the time their babies are 3 months of
age, with only 12 states, as of 2000, exempting them from any work obli-
gation until the infant’s first birthday (Kamerman, 2000). This period
matches the 12-week leave period provided under the FMLA, although in
contrast to these welfare provisions, family and medical leave under the
act is unpaid.
Although the FMLA includes leave provision to care for dependents
other than children (such as the elderly)—which renders it unique and ar-
guably progressive in international terms (Hattiangadi, 2000)—it is pre-
mised on a narrow medical/disability model. This has important implica-
tions for the way in which children’s well-being is addressed. The fact that
family leave is broader in its scope than most comparable countries’paren-
tal leave schema, including an intergenerational component (Wisensale,
2001)5, means that separating out specific provisions for re-assessment
and possible redesign becomes potentially more difficult. This includes
determining the appropriate length of leave to cover the childbearing and
early child-rearing period. This broad-based and uniquely American ap-
proach, although at face value more inclusive and potentially less discrim-
inatory than some other countries’ leave schemes (particularly those
which provide only general-specific maternity leave), also reflects and re-
inforces a lack of prioritization of children’s well-being in United States’
234 JOURNAL OF FAMILY ISSUES / March 2005
courage fathers to take longer leaves. However, this goal appears to be ex-
plicitly driven more by the wider societal ideal of gender equity than by
theories of bonding.
The literature on breastfeeding provides more direct guidance for the
design of parental leave schemes. Current breastfeeding recommenda-
tions and research appear to support the provision of 6 months paid
postnatal leave so that mothers can exclusively breastfeed their infants
during this period. Longer duration of breastfeeding has also been shown
to be protective against breast cancer in women. However, if an initial 6-
month period of leave following childbirth is warranted primarily on ma-
ternal and child health and, to a lesser extent, on cognitive development
grounds, leave then comes to be seen as unavoidably female specific, that
is, pertaining primarily to women. Herein lies the gender equity conun-
drum. In heterosexual, two-parent families, if equality both in the home
and the workplace is to be achieved, parental leave needs to be shared
equally by both parents, thereby avoiding the entrenchment of traditional
roles and responsibilities. This then necessitates longer periods of leave so
that parents can take leave consecutively. Paid leave lasting longer than six
months would ensure that fathers have the opportunity to spend time with
their child, as well as balancing the breastfeeding mother’s potential time
input during the early months.
One way of achieving this scenario would be to emulate some aspects
of the Swedish public policy model. Although much progress is required
if full gender equality is to be attained, Sweden has nevertheless managed
to design and develop a parental leave policy package that recognizes and
addresses the dual and often conflicting objectives of child health and
gender equity. Although the United States is characterized by a very dif-
ferent institutional and public policy climate, measures that would enable
both health-promoting behavior and equitable leave-taking practices be-
tween women and men need to be developed. The need to ensure equity
and redistribution, as well as to enhance children’s life chances and oppor-
tunities regardless of their family context, provides one of the strongest ar-
guments for government intervention and redesign of appropriate
parental leave policy, including in terms of its duration.
However, whereas research suggests that a period of leave supports
breastfeeding duration, for a variety of reasons many new mothers either
need to or wish to return to work before 6 months. In the United States,
where leave is unpaid, many individuals are not covered by the FMLA,
and the cost of being out of employment is also seemingly higher than in
some other countries, the pressure for an early return to work is likely to be
more intense. In countries such as the United States, workplace measures
Galtry, Callister / ASSESSING PARENTAL LEAVE 239
NOTES
1. These traditional roles may also be difficult to change at a later time. Furthermore, if
parents separate, the primary caregiver will generally become the custodial parent.
2. In 1995, 84% of Swedish mothers took 300 or more days of leave (Swedish National
Social Insurance Board, 2001).
3. The World Health Organization notes that a country’s caesarean section rates should
be no higher than 10%-15% (Gerrard, 2001).
4. Forty percent of those women who returned to paid employment before 16 weeks
nevertheless continued to breastfeed beyond the infant’s first birthday (Auerbach & Guss,
1984).
5. Researchers and advocates for family and medical leave are divided on the value of
initiatives proposing to limit paid leave to parental care alone. For instance, Wisensale (2001)
argues that the FMLA was originally designed to provide intergenerational family care to en-
able eligible individuals to take time off from work to care for a child or an elderly parent. Ac-
cording to Wisensale, it is important to maintain this broad approach, given the impending re-
ality of a large retirement population.
6. Separate provisions are also included for maternity leave (14 weeks) and paternity
leave (10 days).
7. According to 1999 figures, after Poland, the United States had the highest infant mor-
tality rates among OECD countries (OECD, 1999).
8. This analysis was later expanded to include 16 countries (Ruhm, 2000b).
9. Sweden is one of the leading countries among the developed nations with respect to
breastfeeding practice. It not only has a high breastfeeding initiation rate—in 1997, at one
week of age, 97% of infants were breastfed (93% exclusively, 4% partially)—but it is also no-
table for its breastfeeding frequency rates, especially for infants at six months of age. In this
age group, fully 73% of all children born in 1998 were breastfed (41% exclusively breastfed
and 32% partially breastfed) (Swedish National Board of Health and Welfare, 2000).
10. In 1998, 64% of American infants were breastfed (that is, received any amount of
breast milk at all) in “the early postpartum period,” whereas at 6 months, only 29% of babies
were breastfed (U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, 2000).
11. Sweden has for a long time promoted the notion of children’s rights and was, along
with the other Nordic countries, a major force behind the development of the United Nations’
1989 Convention on the Rights of the Child and in 1990 was one of the earliest countries to
ratify it.
12. Another component of the Nordic family-work package, which is not directly the
subject of this article but is nevertheless critical in facilitating the labor market attachment of
leave-taking employees, is their extensive, high-quality, state-subsidized child care pro-
grams. In Sweden, for instance, child care provisions conjoin with the parental leave entitle-
ment through the provision of paid parental leave for 15 months, followed by high-quality,
subsidized day care. This particular policy configuration serves through economic incentives
to shape and uphold the at-home ideal for the very young (followed by an out-of-home period
in day care), which, to varying degrees, is at the heart of Nordic family-work policy. This pol-
icy package also has important fiscal implications—a factor that has sometimes been over-
looked in international analyses supportive of the Swedish model (Galtry, 2001).
13. There are, however, variations in the timing of return to paid work among Swedish
women. Stafford and Sundström (1994) suggest that there is a tendency for better paid and
Galtry, Callister / ASSESSING PARENTAL LEAVE 241
more highly educated mothers to resume employment more rapidly after childbirth than
those with lower education levels and lower rates of pay.
14. U.S. economist Barbara Bergmann argues that paid maternity leaves not only rein-
force the notion that child rearing and other household chores are primarily the responsibility
of women but also are “really another version of pay for housewives” (1986, p. 213).
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