Impact of a child’s disability on the probability of the mother taking up paid employment

Abstract

Performing paid work is beneficial in many ways, but not every person has equal access to it because of their social and economic situation. Discrepancies in this field are especially visible in the case of mothers. The aim of the study is to assess the impact of the child’s disability on the probability of the mother taking up paid employment. The empirical analysis used a decomposition method derived from the Blinder and Oaxaca approach and the logistic regression. The analysis was based on individual household-level data from the representative Household Budget Survey for the years 2005–2020. When analysing the average from all the years, the employment rate of mothers of children without disabilities reached 70.9%, and that of mothers of children with disabilities only 40.2%. This gap was widening throughout the studied period. The lower employment rate among mothers of children with disabilities is caused in the most part directly by the child’s disability (and the resulting factors). However, the variable that had the greatest impact on the economic activity in both groups of mothers was education.