The Gender Gap in Market Work Hours Among Canadians: Examining Essential(ist) Linkages to Parenting Time and Household Labour Hours

Abstract

Using 2015 Canadian time diary data, we analyse how the gender gap in market work hours is linked to gender inequality in parenting time and household labour hours (N = 2,296). Among Canadians who are 15–34 years of age, we examine three family groupings, single without children, married without children and married with children. For the married with children group, we focus on respondents with at least one child aged 0–4 years. We find that the gender gap in market work is not significant for those single and married without children. For the married without children group, a gender gap exists for household labour. This suggests that a gender gap in household labour exists prior to the onset of children. As expected, a large gender gap in market work presents itself for married/common law respondents with young children. Half of the gender gap in market work is explained by household labour hours and parenting time. Our study demonstrates that time allocations contribute substantively to gender inequality in market work. Yet, the large unexplained part of the gap suggests that this issue is larger and more complex than mere bargaining decisions about domestic and market time.

JEL: I24, J13, J16, C10