To Örebro University

By combining quantitative analyses of survey data with qualitative analyses of interviewswith first-time parents, this study gives new insights into parents’ division of parental leavein Sweden and the links between fathers’ leave length and the division of child care whenboth are back at work again. Quantitative results show that mothers’ and fathers’ parentalleave lengths vary substantially with the reasons for division of leave and that fathers’parental leave length is related to the long-term division of child care as well as to mothers’satisfaction with it. Qualitative results suggest that although gender equality and equalparenting is central to the first-time, middle-class parents that were interviewed, moretraditional norms and ideals about the mother as the primary caretaker may stand in the wayof an equal sharing of the leave during the child’s first year. The study also suggests severalmechanisms through which fathers’ parental leave may causally influence later division ofchildcare, including a development of a closer relationship between the father and the childand a greater understanding between the parents.

This is one of only a few studies on the division of care leave for sick children between parents in Sweden and the first to attempt to examine the importance of differences in parents’ work characteristics. The study uses register data for parents with children born in 1999-2002 to analyse two aspects of working life that may influence how parents divide care leave between them: The parents’ relative wagesand differences in their occupations. First, the results show that a father’s share of care leave increases as the mother’s economic dependence decreases. This suggests that decisions about care leave are influenced by bargaining power gained through relative economic resources. Second, the resources of couples where both partners work in the same occupation are more equal than the resources of other couples. Their wages are more similar, and they also divide care leave more equally than couples where the partners work in different occupations. However, the fact that couples who work in the same occupation tend to share more equally does not seem to be explained by similarities in the partners’ work characteristics or by relatively low economic dependenceof women, but instead may be explained by unmeasured, stable characteristics. Gender egalitarianism and greater possibilities for women in terms of career and wages are put forward as possible characteristics for couples working inthe same occupation that may influence the way they divide care leave.

I Fokus13 beskriver Ungdomsstyrelsen jämställdhetssituationen för unga inom områdena utbildning och lärande, arbete och försörjning, hälsa och utsatthet, inflytande och representation samt kultur och fritid. Rapporten utgår från två stora enkätundersökningar, intervjuer med unga och en genomgång av tidigare studier. Man beskriver också förändringsarbete, med exempel på verksamheter som arbetar för ökad jämställdhet. Utifrån analysen ger Ungdomsstyrelsen förslag på hur arbetet kan utvecklas ytterligare framöver. Fokus13 är Ungdomsstyrelsens nionde tematiska analys inom ungdomspolitiken.