Geography Plays a Part in Access to Work-Family Benefits
Julie Schwartz Weber September 23rd, 2009
The Carsey Institute at the University of New Hampshire recently published a new brief, “Family-Friendly Policies for Rural Working Mothers.” This brief, authored by Assistant Professor and Faculty Fellow Rebecca Glauber, analyzes the differences in access to family-friendly policies between rural and urban mothers. Glauber concludes that rural women are less likely than their urban counterparts to have access to family-friendly policies, including paid sick days, parental leave, flextime, and health insurance.
Importantly, Glauber asks why this difference in access exists. She writes that there are a “number of factors that contribute to the rural- -urban gap in mothers’ access.” While she indicates that education is a “strong predictor of access to family-friendly policies,” she asserts that approximately 50% of the gap in access to sick or vacation days is due to differences in rural mothers’ versus urban mothers’ work establishment size, occupation, and industry, and unionization. That is, rural workers tend to work in smaller places and in industries that provide fewer benefits.
In addition, Glauber finds that a particular subset of rural mothers – single mothers – fare particularly poorly concerning access to family-friendly policies. For instance, according to Glauber, 41% of rural single mothers do not have access to paid sick days compared to 38% of all rural mothers and 30% of urban mothers. Similarly, Glauber finds that over one-fifth of rural single mothers do not have access to any paid days off (sick days or vacation days) compared to 16% of all rural mothers and 14% of urban mothers. Again, Glauber concludes that single rural mothers have the least access to family-friendly benefits because they have less education, work for smaller firms, and work in jobs that are less likely to offer benefits.
To find more information on rural families and work-family issues, please see our Work and Family Encyclopedia entry “Rural Families and Work-Family Issues,” by Lisa R. Pruitt.
