Women’s and men’s incomes following childbearing
Marty Grace
Victoria University, Melbourne
Contact Email:   Marty.Gracevu.edu.au

Australian women continue to earn lower hourly rates than men and to have lower lifetime earnings. Factors maintaining this inequality include the ongoing impact of past sex-role stereotypes, and the different impacts on women and men of childbearing. Women’s major physical role in pregnancy, birth and breastfeeding is paralleled by a significant drop in women’s incomes when they become mothers, and longer-term responsibility for children results in reduced lifetime earnings. Although this impact of childbearing is often accepted as part of the taken-for-granted reality of everyday life, it raises some important philosophical, pragmatic and ethical issues.

Published time-use and employment statistics are based on surveys that are not large enough to allow for fine analysis. This paper reports on a study of women’s and men’s individual weekly incomes following childbearing. The 2001 Census was used, as it is the only Australian data set large enough to allow for analysis by one year increments of age of youngest child, and to examine the data by both gender and family type.

The findings of this study, which have not been not previously published, will be presented and discussed.

Paper Download Information (if available):

Paper130.doc

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