Given the increasing female labour force participation rates in recent decades, the question arises as to whether the daughters of working mothers show different job patterns than the daughters of homemakers. Using data from a sample of 3,169 adult women in the 2002-2004 wave of the Netherlands Kinship Panel Study, we find that women who were raised by a working mother work about two more hours per week than those raised by a homemaking mother. The likelihood that women are currently in the labour market is not affected by their mother's past labour force participation. Women's own educational achievement and the presence of children younger than 12 are the strongest determinants of their participation and work hours. Our findings add to the growing evidence that parental behaviours during childhood have long-reaching consequences for children's behaviours, also in the realm of paid work. This provides a useful explanation for the persisting gender gap in work hours across Europe, in addition to the conventional explanations of education, occupational history and family formation.

This study assesses the relationship between the number of work hours and the provision of instrumental support to parents among 779 middle-aged women and men in dual-worker couples in The Netherlands. Using data from the Netherlands Kinship Panel Study collected during 2002–04, we estimate a simultaneous two-stage probit least-squares model, which takes into account that the competing time and financial demands of a person's engagement in paid work and parental support are endogenous. We explicitly control for the effects of partners' earnings, housework and parent-support contributions, and of co-resident children's time demands and help with domestic tasks. Contrary to expectations, the results do not reveal a conflict between paid work and giving support to parents. Several possible explanations are discussed. The results emphasise the importance of the household context, in that the work hours of both women and men depend on other household members' activities and finances, as does men's provision of parent-support. The striking lack of relationships between women's provision of parental support and any individual and contextual characteristic demonstrates the persistence of gendered roles in family members giving support.