Beyond Participation: How Policy Synergy Between Family Policy and Labor Market Flexibility Shapes Women’s Mental Health, Well-Being, and Workforce Inclusion
Speaker: Matt Parbst (Bocconi University)
Gender disparities in labour force participation and mental health persist, yet existing frameworks overlook policy synergy—the interaction between family policy and labour market flexibility—in shaping economic and psychological well-being. This study introduces the Life Course Synergy Model (LCSM) to examine how institutional arrangements impact women’s workforce inclusion and mental health. Using a longitudinal fixed-effects design across 17 European countries (n = 32,249 working adults; 5,128 parents), we assess whether flexitime and family policy together reduce the gender gap in depression and boost full-time employment among women, particularly mothers.
Findings show that flexitime alone fully explains the gender gap in depression, while family policy alone has a limited effect. However, for mothers, policy synergy is key: high levels of both flexitime and family policy increase full-time employment as household income rises while also equalizing mental health outcomes across socioeconomic groups. This suggests that mental health itself may be a key determinant of women’s labor market attachment. These findings challenge single-policy approaches, showing that support and flexibility must work together to enhance both labor market attachment and well-being. By linking labour market flexibility and family policy to employment and mental health outcomes, this study demonstrates that integrated institutional designs addressing both economic and psychological well-being are essential to achieving gender equality.
Conviction or Consent? Tracing the Influence of Coalition Partners on Family Policy under Centre-Right Ministers
Speaker: Manuel Alvariño Vázquez (EUI)
Many studies have analysed what could motivate centre-right governments to develop progressive family policies, given their historically traditionalist ideology. Updating classic institutionalist accounts, this article expands the focus beyond centre-right parties formally in charge. It argues that in coalition and minority governments, partisan veto players may act as agenda-setters, design policy reforms and successfully exert pressure to approve them through three mechanisms: agreements for government formation, conditions for government survival and bureaucratic continuity. Drawing on novel empirical data from interviews and document analysis, this article applies deductive process tracing to analyse the German parental allowance reform of 2006 and the Spanish 2017 paternity leave extension. The findings complement existing studies that focus on the agency of centre-right parties as ‘protagonists’ of these reforms, arguing that in some cases they have instead ‘consented’ to reforms proposed and supported by other parties.
Please register in order to get a seat and to receive the ZOOM link.