Path-Dependencies in Employment Trajectories Around Motherhood: Comparing Native Versus Second-Generation Migrant Women in Belgium

Abstract

A sizeable body of literature has shown that the migrant-native employment gap is larger among women with children than among childless women, suggesting that the transition to parenthood has a stronger impact on the employment trajectories of migrant origin women compared to those of native women. However, due to the limited use of longitudinal data, our understanding of the mechanisms generating differential employment trajectories around the transition to parenthood remains limited. This study adopts a life course perspective to address path-dependencies in employment trajectories around the transition to motherhood. Using longitudinal data and fixed-effects models that compare within-individual changes in contractual working hours around the transition to parenthood between natives and second-generation migrants of Southern European and Turkish or Moroccan origin in Belgium, we find no migrant-native differentials among women with low employment rates before the birth of their first child and only limited differentials in employment trajectories around parenthood among women with medium and high employment rates before parenthood. This indicates that there is a strong path-dependency of employment trajectories around parenthood for migrant women and natives alike, but that second-generation migrant women generally have a lower pre-birth labour market attachment than native women which accounts for the frequently observed migrant-native differentials in maternal employment.

Mothers and Parental Leave in Belgium: Social Inequalities in Eligibility and Uptake

“…They face more difficulties than migrant men but also compared to native women in securing stable labour market positions (Mussino & Duvander, 2016;Neels, De Wachter, & Peeters, 2018;OECD, 2017). Kil et al (2017) and Maes et al (2021) also document a larger decrease in activity and employment levels after the transition to parenthood of women with a migration background than among native women in Belgium, which is related to the differential stability of employment trajectories of migrant and native women. Other Belgian research shows that individuals with a migration background are often lower educated, which also partially explains their difficult entry into stable employment (Maes et al, 2018).…”

Exploring Women’s Uptake of Active Labour Market Programmes: The Role of Household Composition Across Migrant Origin Groups

“…Following social network theory, time restrictions may hamper networking and the gathering of information regarding ALMPs. The presence of children seems to affect training uptake more strongly among Turkish or Moroccan origin women than among Southern European origin or non-migrant women, which may reflect differential access to formal childcare (Biegel et al, 2021;Maes et al, 2021), or differential preferences regarding women's roles in the labour force and childcare (Khoudja & Fleischmann, 2015;Seibel & Hedegaard, 2017). Social capital available through children may increase the information regarding ALMPs to a larger extent for Southern European women than for Turkish or Moroccan women, as the former's socio-economic position is usually similar to the non-migrant origin group, living in the same neighbourhoods, and using the same childcare institutions (Gallagher & Gerstel, 2001).…”

“…Having established that household composition is essential to understanding women's training uptake, particularly amongst migrant women, we present three fruitful avenues for future research. First, adopting more advanced research designs (e.g., panel regressions), are necessary to contextualise patterns of family formation and assess how a wider range of partner's characteristics and trajectories of family formation (e.g., age and number of children in the household) shape training uptake over the life course (Maes et al, 2019(Maes et al, , 2021Marynissen et al, 2020). Such an approach would allow for a more detailed assessment of the degree to which migrantnative differentials in training uptake are explained by variation in household characteristics.…”

“…Since employment opportunities vary by migrant origin (Baert & De Pauw, 2014), we can expect that the presence of children in the household is likely to differentially affect the enrolment in training of women from diverse migrant origins. Considering the history of these migrant groups in Belgium and previous research, indicating that migrant origin women face restrictions to childcare arrangements (Kil et al, 2018;Maes et al, 2021;Vidal-Coso, 2019), we expect that the presence of children in the household will have larger repercussions for women with Turkish or Moroccan origins than for women with Southern European origins and particularly non-migrant origin women.…”

Uptake of Childcare Arrangements—Grandparental Availability and Availability of Formal Childcare

“…There is substantial evidence that maternal employment is affected by childbearing, while there is no evidence of a negative 'child-penalty' for fathers (Maes et al 2021;Kil et al 2018;Uunk et al 2005). Without access to childcare, continued employment after childbearing is very difficult for mothers.…”