If you’re a working woman who wants to have kids someday, you might want to consider postponing your plans until you’re 30. That’s the advice from a new study that suggests having children before 30 can significantly lower your income.
The study, published in PLOS ONE, analyzed the lifetime earnings of nearly 1.6 million Danish women and found that having children before age 30 reduces their income by an average of $7,567 per child under age 5. The income loss was more severe for women without college degrees who had their first children before age 25.
“The findings highlight the financial trade-offs women make when considering their fertility and career decisions,” said Man Yee (Mallory) Leung, PhD, a postdoctoral research associate at Washington University School of Medicine and one of the authors of the study.
The researchers explained that having children early can slow down the accumulation of human capital and limit the career opportunities for mothers. They also suggested that mothers may face employer discrimination or social norms that pressure them to prioritize family over work.
“Children do not kill careers, but the earlier children arrive the more their mother’s income suffers. There is a clear incentive for delaying,” said Raul Santaeulalia-Llopis, an assistant professor of economics at Washington University and another author of the study.
The study also found that the income loss was not compensated by higher earnings later in life, as some previous studies have suggested. Instead, the researchers argued that mothers may make a trade-off between monetary and non-monetary rewards when looking for a job, such as choosing jobs with more family-friendly working conditions and lower pay.
However, another study published in Social Science Research challenged this theory and found that mothers are not more likely than fathers or childless men and women to choose jobs with more family-friendly working conditions and lower pay. The study used a vignette experiment in four European countries and presented participants with fictional job-openings that varied randomly on family-friendly working conditions and wages.
“These results suggest that the motherhood wage gap may not be explained by compensating wage differentials, but by mothers’ higher likelihood of applying for jobs with lower wages,” said Nick Wuestenenk and Katia Begall, the authors of the study.
The motherhood wage gap is one of the most persistent drivers of gender inequality in our economy, according to Julie Kashen, director for women’s economic justice at The Century Foundation. She said that the Build Back Better Plan proposed by President Biden would help reduce the motherhood penalty by providing universal pre-K, child care subsidies, paid family and medical leave, and tax credits for families with children.
“The Build Back Better Plan would help millions of women return to work by making child care more affordable and accessible,” said Senator Patty Murray, chair of the Senate Health, Education, Labor and Pensions Committee.
So, if you’re a woman who wants to have it all – a fulfilling career and a happy family – you might want to wait until you’re 30 to have your first child. Or better yet, wait until the Build Back Better Plan becomes a reality.
Relevant articles:
– The Build Back Better Plan Would Reduce the Motherhood Penalty, The Century Foundation, October 8, 2021
– The motherhood wage gap and trade-offs between family and work: A test of compensating wage differentials, Social Science Research, August 2022
– The motherhood wage gap and trade-offs between family and work: A test of compensating wage differentials, PubMed, April 13, 2022
– For women, waiting to have children until after 30 minimizes career income losses, Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis, April 13, 2016