Lessons from the pandemic: family well-being, childcare and gender

This hybrid event will pull together findings from Nuffield Foundation funded projects and related research, using lessons learned from the pandemic to provide insights into family well-being, childcare and gender.

Mothers work less, earn less and dedicate more of their time to housework and childcare than fathers. Availability of and state support for childcare is particularly important for mothers and they are disproportionately affected when it is withdrawn or access to it is limited. When schools and nurseries closed due to the pandemic, mothers took up more of the burden of childcare and home-schooling than fathers.

In recent Nuffield Foundation funded research, Professor Birgitta Rabe and co-authors from the University of Essex examine the causal effect of school availability on families. The striking finding from their research is that mothers experienced sharp falls in well-being when their children were out of school, but there was no effect on fathers’ well-being.

This event will launch these findings and considers their more general implications. Pandemic school closures can be considered a restriction on childcare. Will future restrictions in childcare access once again harm women’s well-being?

• Megan Jarvie, Coram Family and Childcare, will review prospects for the childcare sector and its security going forward. The particular importance of the provision of childcare for women, and the evidence that its restriction negatively affected women’s mental health follows from a lack of equality in the home and labour market.
• Professor Almudena Sevilla will consider the long-term effects of the pandemic on gender equality.
• Professor Lucinda Platt will give an overview of the gender aspects of the Deaton review on inequality.
• A panel discussion will round off the event.

This hybrid event will be held at the Nuffield Foundation in London with the option to watch the presentations and take part in the discussions online.

In-person guests are invited to arrive at the Nuffield Foundation for registration from 9:30am. The event will begin at 10:00am and will be followed by a networking lunch.

This event has now passed, however, you can watch the recording of it below.