Abstract
This chapter investigates the extent to which self-reported well-being, as measured by life satisfaction, for parents living in traditional (coupled mothers and fathers with dependant children) and new family arrangements (lone mothers and fathers) is affected by the use of work-life balance arrangements (WLB, henceforth) (formal and informal) as a coping strategy with the time pressures derived from their labour market responsibilities.
Access this chapter
Tax calculation will be finalised at checkout
Purchases are for personal use only
Notes
- 1.
The countries are: Austria (AT), Belgium (BE), Bulgaria (BG), Cyprus (CY), Czech Republic (CZ), Germany (DE), Denmark (DK), Estonia (EE), Spain (ES), Finland (FI), France (FR), Greece (GR), Croatia (HR), Hungary (HU), Ireland (IE), Iceland (IS), Italy (IT), Lithuania (LT), Luxembourg (LU), Latvia (LV), Montenegro (ME), Macedonia (MK), Malta (MT), Netherlands (NL), Poland (PL), Portugal (PT), Romania (RO), Serbia (RS), Sweden (SE), Slovenia (SI), Slovakia (SK), Turkey (TR), United Kingdom (UK), Kosovo (XK).
- 2.
Multilevel analysis is especially suited to introduce country-level variables to investigate their impact on life satisfaction and also (through cross-level interactions) to analyse whether the impact of individual-level variables on life satisfaction varies across certain country-level characteristics. Yet, for this chapter I do not consider the role of country-level characteristics directly. Although, variations in self-reported childcare arrangements by respondents have surely to do with how accessible these arrangements are in each country through public policies.
- 3.
Unfortunately, given the reduced sample size for the multivariate analysis in the next section formal childcare arrangements have to be merged with informal childcare arrangements into a single category for both childcare arrangements.
- 4.
Given the sample size it is not possible to distinguish further by the age of children. In any case, 0–12 years old is traditionally regarded, in research on childcare arrangements, as the age of dependant children.
- 5.
For the sake of simplicity to present the results in this descriptive section, given the large number of countries analysed, here I use the self-reported hours of work in its continuous format instead of the categorical variable used in the multivariate analysis in the next section.
References
Aybars, A. I. (2007). Work-life balance in the EU and leave arrangements across welfare regimes. Industrial Relations Journal, 38, 569–590.
Becker, G. S. (1991). A treatise on the family. Cambridge: Harvard University Press.
Benin, M. H., & Nienstedt, B. C. (1985). Happiness in single- and dual-earner families: The effects of marital happiness, job satisfaction, and life cycle. Journal of Marriage and the Family, 47, 975–984.
Bonney, N. (2005). Overworked Britons? Part-time work and work-life balance. Work, Employment and Society, 19, 391–401.
Bonney, N. (2007). Gender, employment and social class. Work, Employment and Society, 21, 143–155.
Booth, A. L., & Van Ours, J. C. (2007). Job satisfaction and family happiness: The part-time work puzzle (ISER Working Paper). Colchester.
Cebolla, H. (2013). Introducción al análisis multinivel (Vol. 49). Madrid: Centro de Investigaciones Sociológicas.
Cousins, C. R., & Tang, N. (2004). Working time and work and family conflict in the Netherlands, Sweden and the UK. Work, Employment and Society, 18, 531–549.
Crompton, R., Brockmann, M., & Lyonette, C. (2005). Attitudes, women’s employment and the domestic division of labour: A cross-national analysis in two waves. Work, Employment and Society, 19, 215–233.
Dex, S., & Bond, S. (2005). Measuring work-life balance and its covariates. Work, Employment and Society, 19, 627–637.
Dyer, W. G. (1956). A comparison of families of high and low job satisfaction. Marriage and Family Living, 18, 58–60.
England, P., & Farkas, G. (1986). Households, employment, and gender : a social, economic, and demographic view. New York: Aldine Pub. Co.
Esping-Andersen, G. (1990). The three worlds of welfare capitalism. Cambridge: Polity Press.
Esping-Andersen, G. (1999). Social foundations of post-industrial economies. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
Esping-Andersen, G. (2002). Why we need a new welfare state. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
Ferrera, M. (1996). The “southern model” of welfare in social Europe. Journal of European Social Policy, 6(1), 17–37.
Freeman, R. B. (1978). Job satisfaction as an economic variable. The American Economic Review, 68, 135–141.
Gambles, R., Lewis, S., & Rapoport, R. (2006). The myth of work-life balance: The challenge of our time for men, women and societies. Chichester: Wiley.
Glenn, N. D., & Weaver, C. N. (1982). Further evidence on education and job satisfaction. Social Forces, 61, 46–55.
Gruenberg, B. (1980). The happy worker: An analysis of educational and occupational differences in determinants of job satisfaction. The American Journal of Sociology, 86, 247–271.
Hakim, C. (1996). Key issues in women’s work: Female heterogeneity and the polarisation of women’s employment. London: Atlantic Highlands.
Hakim, C. (2000). Work-lifestyle choices in the 21st century: Preference theory. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
Hanson, S. L., & Sloane, D. M. (1992). Young children and job satisfaction. Journal of Marriage and the Family, 54, 799–811.
Healy, G. (2004). Work-life balance and family friendly policies. In whose interest? Work, Employment and Society, 18, 219–223.
Hochschild, A. R. (1997). The time bind: When work becomes home and home becomes work. New York: Metropolitan Books.
Hoque, K., & Noon, M. (2004). Equal opportunities policy and practice in Britain: Evaluating the empty shell hypothesis. Work, Employment and Society, 18, 481–506.
Houston, D. (Ed.). (2005). Work-life balance in the 21st century. Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan.
Hyman, J., Scholarios, D., & Baldry, C. (2005). Getting on or getting by? Employee flexibility and coping strategies for home and work. Work, Employment and Society, 19, 705–725.
Janson, P., & Martin, J. K. (1982). Job satisfaction and age: A test of two views. Social Forces, 60, 1089–1102.
Kaiser, L. (2005). Gender-job satisfaction differences across Europe: An indicator for labour market modernization (IZA-Discussion Paper Series). Bonn.
Kalleberg, A. L. (1977). Work values and job rewards: A theory of job satisfaction. American Sociological Review, 42, 124–143.
Kalleberg, A. L., & Loscocco, K. A. (1983). Aging, values, and rewards: Explaining age differences in job satisfaction. American Sociological Review, 48, 78–90.
Lewis, J., & Campbell, M. (2007). Work/family balance policies in the UK since 1997: A new departure? Journal of Social Policy, 36, 365–381.
Lundberg, S., & Pollak, R. A. (1993). Separate spheres bargaining and the marriage market. Journal of Political Economy, 101, 988–1010.
Marks, S. R. (1994). Intimacy in the public realm: The case of co-workers. Social Forces, 72, 843–858.
Moss, P., & Korintus, M. (2008). International review of leave policies and related research (Employment relations research series, No 100, July 2008, URN 08/157).
OECD. (2005). Babies and bosses: Reconciling work and family life. Canada: OECD.
Rose, M. (2003). Good deal, bad deal? Job satisfaction in occupations. Work, Employment and Society, 17, 503–530.
Shelton, B. A., & Daphne, J. (1996). The division of household labor. Annual Review of Sociology, 22, 299–322.
Smeaton, D. (2006). Work return rates after childbirth in the UK: Trends determinants and implications: a comparison of cohorts born in 1958 and 1970. Work, Employment and Society, 20, 5–25.
Stapel, J. (1950). What is job satisfaction? The Public Opinion Quarterly, 14, 551–554.
Snijders, T. A. B., & Bosker, R. J. (2012). Multilevel analysis: An introduction to basic and advanced multilevel modeling. Los Angeles: SAGE.
Van der Lippe, T. (2004). Dutch workers and time pressure: Household and workplace characteristics. Work, Employment and Society, 21, 693–711.
Varca, P. E., Shaffer, G. S., & McCauley, C. D. (1983). Sex differences in job satisfaction revisited. The Academy of Management Journal, 26, 348–353.
Weaver, C. N. (1978). Sex differences in the determinants of job satisfaction. The Academy of Management Journal, 21, 265–274.
Wharton, A. S., Rotolo, T., & Bird, S. R. (2000). Social context at work: A multilevel analysis of job satisfaction. Sociological Forum, 15, 65–90.
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Corresponding author
Editor information
Editors and Affiliations
Rights and permissions
Copyright information
© 2016 Springer Japan
About this chapter
Cite this chapter
Martínez-Pérez, Á. (2016). Can Work-Life Balance Policies Foster Happiness Within the Family? A Comparison of Traditional Versus New Family Arrangements. In: Tachibanaki, T. (eds) Advances in Happiness Research. Creative Economy. Springer, Tokyo. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-4-431-55753-1_15
Download citation
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-4-431-55753-1_15
Publisher Name: Springer, Tokyo
Print ISBN: 978-4-431-55752-4
Online ISBN: 978-4-431-55753-1
eBook Packages: Economics and FinanceEconomics and Finance (R0)