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EXCERPTS
More working parents are looking to get by without formal childcare for their infants, but mothers almost always shoulder the extra burden.
One-third of families stick to "parent-only care" if they are both employed and have a child under 14 months, but in many cases this is achieved by the mother doing a paid job, usually from home, and looking after the child at the same time.
In new research from the Australian Institute of Family Studies that is hardly flattering to fathers, a significant number of women look to juggle paid work and motherhood by working up to 16 hours a week while their child is an infant.
But whether they use "non-parental care" (paid childcare or informal care by a relative or friend) to allow them to undertake this work makes virtually no difference to how often fathers look after the child on their own.
"In considering how families manage with parent-only care when they have a young child but both work, it should not be assumed this is always facilitated by sharing the childcare between both parents," says the study, titled Parent-only care: a childcare choice for working couple families?
"While this occurs in some families, in others it appears that mothers continue to take on the primary role of carer in the family while also taking on paid employment. In dual-employed families, there was little difference in the extent which fathers regularly provided care between those who did and did not use non-parental care (57 per cent and 53 per cent respectively)."
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"Night/evening work by the mother was associated with an 8per cent increase in the probability of the father regularly providing care, and working weekends with a 14 per cent increase," the report says.
Matthew Gray, AIFS deputy director and the report's co-author, said short hours working from home or being self-employed suited breastfeeding women. About 44per cent of employed mothers with infants worked fewer than 16 hours a week. "Bookkeeping, typing, editing work, these are the types of things women do from home while their infant is with them," Dr Gray said.
Women at the manager/professional level are less likely to use parent-only care because care is more affordable for them, and their jobs less flexible.
- reprinted from The Australian