Everyone has seen the videos of working parents having a Zoom meeting only to be interrupted by the antics of some adorable toddler. But while the rest of the world watches with delight, those videos highlight a challenge that is all too real for employed mothers and fathers: a lack of reliable child care.
Even before the pandemic brought this issue to the mainstream, employers had begun to recognize the need to invest in family-focused benefits that help employees find backup care for their children. As early as 2018, major employers including Starbucks and Best Buy announced that they would provide employees with backup child care benefits.
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Families where both parents work full-time make up 46% of U.S. households, according to data from Pew Research Center, yet only 9% of employers are providing or considering providing child care subsidies, and only 7% were providing or considering providing onsite child care services, according to the Society for Human Resource Management.
Offering child care and other family-focused benefits doesn’t just help employees manage a stressful personal issue, it can also create a more productive, loyal, and equitable workforce.
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Workplace norms are still rooted in traditional gender roles, and women are more likely to pause or abandon their careers in order to raise a child — but those assumptions are no longer reflective of today’s workforce, says Leilani Carver, an associate professor of communications at Maryville University and an expert on women in leadership.
“What has happened in our culture is that women pay the penalty [for having a child]. Men are rewarded and more likely to get promoted after becoming a parent, whereas women find the opposite happening,” Carver says. “It's perceived that if you're going to be a mom, you are going to focus more on your child and that means you're going to have less organizational commitment.”
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But balancing child care and a commitment to work can be costly for the employee. In 2020, 57% of parents spent over $10,000 on child care, according to a survey by Care.com. Almost 60% of the parents surveyed plan to spend more than $10,000 on child care again in 2021. It’s one reason why, between March and April of 2020, about 3.5 million mothers living with school-age children stopped active work by taking either paid or unpaid leave, losing their job, or exiting the labor force altogether, according to the Census Bureau.
A lack of reliable child care isn’t just stunting the career growth of women. People of color are statistically less likely to be able to afford quality child care and early education programs, according to research from the Center for Law and Social Policy.
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“This isn’t only a gender equity issue, but a racial issue as well,” Carver says. “There's systemic issues in access to quality child care. If [employers] really want an equitable workforce, providing child care not only touches on gender bias, but they're also touching on racial biases well.”
Flexible schedules can be a first step for employers who want to support working parents, Carver says. Additionally, companies should consider creating specific policies around flexible work arrangements and parental leave time so employees are aware of expectations and allowances.
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“Employers have to think about the people you want and the loyalty,” Carver says. “It’s going to be a short time that you're providing child care as an employee benefit, but an employer who does that is going to retain talent, and you're going to have an increase in organizational commitment. This shows that you are a place that actually values the employee as a whole person and not just as a cog.”
