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Parenthood, Employment, Domestic Labour and Fertility: Piecing the Puzzle together in Australia

Alyce Raybould, University College London
Rebecca Sear, London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine (LSHTM)

Household division of paid and unpaid labour has been theoretically and empirically linked with the probability of having children in high-income contexts. Further, division of labour is known to change considerably when individuals first become parents. Previous work has sought to identify trajectories of women’s employment before and after first birth. In this analysis, we explore the joint changes in paid and unpaid labour responsibilities around first birth using sequence analysis and explore whether these changes are related to the probability of having a second child. Using longitudinal time-use data from Australia, we clustered women into four groups. We then explored whether there are demographic characteristics associated with these trajectories, and whether cluster membership is associated with probability of progressing to second births. We found women who consistently do unpaid work were more likely to be younger and unpartnered at first birth. We also found women who consistently do paid and unpaid work across the transition to parenthood were more likely to be higher educated. Furthermore, this group was the slowest to progress to a second birth. This analysis therefore disentangles some of the complex interactions between the onset of parenthood, changing paid and unpaid labour dynamics, and family trajectories.

Keywords: Family demography, Fertility and childbirth, Gender, Longitudinal studies

See paper.

  Presented in Session 185. Family Transitions in Longitudinal Perspective