Just recently, I had a discussion with my friend, “Carrie”, who is a mother of three children, one being special needs, about how her employer had denied her request to adjust her work hours. Her requested shift would have worked better for her family’s needs, but they denied her due to a lack of education credentials. This would usually be understandable, but she knew other staff with the same education level as her who were working that shift. The one key difference between those workers and my friend? She had been requesting more time off to care for her child’s health concerns while the other staff didn’t have young children themselves.
Inequitable Treatment is Still Commonplace
My friend’s situation isn’t unique. While discrimination based on pregnancy and parental status is illegal in most places, business leaders and hiring managers still find workarounds to pressure women to leave their jobs. According to the American Civil Liberties Union, this can look like the refusal of work modifications or workplace accommodations, such as time for pumping breastmilk. Companies also pressure working parents by requiring all employees to work full-time or transferring them to jobs that pay less after the child is born.
For Women, Starting a Family is Socially Encouraged, but Economically Punished
This is known as the “motherhood penalty.” US workplaces operate off an outdated image of the family, with the man being the breadwinner and the woman being the caretaker. This can lead to large income gaps in opposite-sex couples. Hiring managers often overlook working mothers, and this often devolves into asking discriminatory and unlawful questions to female job applicants about family planning. When employers do hire a working mother, they end up offering her a lower salary than they would to other women. Fathers don’t seem to face the same penalty. In fact, studies show that when men become fathers, their salaries tend to increase. Even though families have changed, women’s acceptance in the workplace has not.
An example that made headlines was Res-Care/Equus, a workplace solutions company, being required to pay $125,000 in an Equal Employment Opportunity Commission discrimination case. Their facility in New Mexico had violated federal law by discriminating against a woman due to her high-risk pregnancy. When she asked for time to attend a medical appointment, she was fired. Prenatal care, pregnancy, and caretaking affect many of the career choices working mothers make, and when those needs aren’t met, they leave the workforce. If they aren’t leaving the workforce entirely, they are looking for companies that offer better childcare services.
When Women Leave, Companies Falter
Companies could be facing their own “penalties” as well. In Maven’s paper “Back-to-Work”, they describe how the costs of replacing female employees who leave, covering postpartum healthcare issues, managing the effects of postpartum struggles, and settling potential lawsuits can add up to billions of dollars. The solution isn’t as simple as giving longer maternity leave either. Historically, maternity programs have focused primarily on the health of the business or the child, so one proposed solution involves providing more support to mothers.
Maven suggests providing vigilant screening programs to prevent postpartum health issues, employer childcare programs to remove the need to leave the workforce, and assistance for new mothers transitioning back into the office. With women and mothers making up more and more of the workforce, it is time that companies see their talent as something worth fighting for rather than overlooking completely.
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