Are step families’ couples more egalitarian? Gender gap in labor market participation in Spain

1. European Network for the Sociological and Demographic Studies of Divorce Are step families’ couples more egalitarian? Gender gap in labor market participation in Spain Jordi Gumà jguma@ced.uab.es Iñaki Permanyer inaki.permanyer@uab.es Rocio Treviño rtrevino@ced.uab.es This work is part of the research project “Hogares de familias reconstituidas y equidad de género : ¿nuevas paradojas?” and should be considered as a product of the Spanish R+D project 2008-2011. (Ref. CSO2008-00654).

2. A Basic definition • A step family (or reconstituted family) is a married or cohabiting couple living in the same household in which one or both members of the couple have children from a previous relationship.

3. Main goals • Study and compare the socio-demographic profile of reconstituted vs non-reconstituted families. • Study gender inequality patterns within reconstituted couples and compare them w.r.t. non-reconstituted ones. • Labor market participation. • Domestic work • Cross national comparisons.

4. Motivation • The emergence of step families is an increasingly widespread phenomenon. • Children’s well-being.

5. In this presentation • Study and compare the socio-demographic profile of reconstituted vs non-reconstituted families. • Study gender inequality patterns within reconstituted couples and compare them w.r.t. non-reconstituted ones. • Labor market participation. • Domestic work • Cross national comparisons.

6. Cross-national comparisons:Identification problems • Most countries’ censuses do not have explicit questions to identify reconstituted families. • For those countries with explicit questions (Italy, Portugal, US) we don’t get reliable results either. • Main Problem: Step families are hard to identify, highly heterogeneous, making international comparisons particularly difficult.

7. The Spanish case • Data Sources: • 2001 Census Round. • EPA (Encuesta de Población Activa: Spanish Labour force survey) • Other surveys have too small samples

8. Socio-demographic profile • Absolute and relative number of reconstituted families in Spain according to different variables: • Who brings the children • Marriage vs consensual union • Civil status • Age • Education • Nationality • Labor market participation

9. Percent of reconstituted families over biparental families with children, Spain 1999-2009 Authors’ calculations based on EPA data

10. Profiles (I) Authors’ calculations based on 2001 Census data

11. Profiles (II) Reconstituted families distribution according to who brings the children from a previous relationship. Authors’ calculations using Spanish 2001 Census microdata. Percentage of reconstituted families with common children according to who brings the children from a previous relationship. Authors’ calculations using Spanish 2001 Census microdata.

12. Profiles (III) Authors’ calculations based on EPA data

13. Consensual Union levels Authors’ calculations based on EPA data

14. Civil Status Authors’ calculations based on EPA data

15. Age distribution (I) Authors’ calculations based on 2009 EPA data

16. Age distribution (II) Authors’ calculations based on 2009 EPA data

17. Age heterogamy Authors’ calculations based on 2009 EPA data

18. Education Authors’ calculations based on 2009 EPA data

19. Nationality Authors’ calculations based on 2009 EPA data

20. Women’s activity rates (I) Authors’ calculations using Spanish 2001 Census microdata.

21. Women’s activity rates (II) Authors’ calculations using Spanish 2001 Census microdata.

22. Conclusions and Future research (I) • Reconstituted families have heterogeneous sociodemographic profiles, so they can not be treated as a single entity. • This heterogeneity might be due to the many ways in which reconstituted families can be constructed. In the future, it would be desirable to use biographical analysis.

23. Conclusions and Future research (II) • Cross sectional analysis shows that women bringing their children to a reconstituted family have lower social capital (in terms of education and labour market participation) than their monoparental counterparts. • Women in reconstituted families have a higher labour market participation than women with children in non-reconstituted families. • Future research: explore gender differences between reconstituted and non-reconstituted families w.r.t. domestic work.

24. European Network for the Sociological and Demographic Studies of Divorce Are step families’ couples more egalitarian? Gender gap in labor market participation in Spain Jordi Gumà jguma@ced.uab.es Iñaki Permanyer inaki.permanyer@uab.es Rocio Treviño rtrevino@ced.uab.es This work is part of the research project “Hogares de familias reconstituidas y equidad de género : ¿nuevas paradojas?” and should be considered as a product of the Spanish R+D project 2008-2011. (Ref. CSO2008-00654).