The motherhood penalty in Spain: the effect of full-and part-time parental leave on women's earnings

Abstract

The persistence of a wage gap between mothers and non-mothers has been widely analyzed. However, we know little about the impact of family policies on this relative motherhood penalty. This study investigates the extent to which unpaid leave granted for longer-term care of young children after an initial spell of maternity leave affects the motherhood wage gap, and whether full-time leave and part-time leave differ in this respect. We use panel data from the Continuous Sample of Working Lives and rely on a sample consisting of 959,359 women aged twenty-five to forty-seven between 2005 and 2012. We find first a negative association between use and duration of unpaid parental leave and mothers' wages, and second that a full-time unpaid leave carries higher wage penalties than a part-time unpaid leave of the same duration. This study has major implications for policymaking.