Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System

March 24, 2023

Gender Gaps in the Labor Market Widen Every Summer

Brendan M. Price and Melanie Wasserman¹

Introduction

Gender gaps in labor market activity are pervasive, longstanding, and a regular subject of policy debates. Relative to men, women tend to work fewer hours per week, more conventional hours, and fewer years over the course of their lives.² These differences in the intensity and timing of work contribute to gender disparities in promotions and pay.³ But despite decades of research on this topic, little attention has been paid to the timing of work throughout the year. To motivate our inquiry, Figure 1 plots the monthly labor force participation rates of prime-age US women and men using non–seasonally adjusted data, with June, July, and August shaded gray. Summer after summer, women's labor force participation drops sharply while men's participation does not.

Figure 1. The summer drop in prime-age female labor force participation

In this Note, we summarize some of the key findings from our research paper "The Summer Drop in Female Employment", available at SSRN (https://dx.doi.org/10.2139/ssrn.4352186). First, we document that women's employment and hours worked fall consistently during the summer months. Next, we show that school closures for summer break—and consequent lapses in school-provided childcare—are the root cause of these declines. We then explain how women's lower employment rate over the summer reflects both sectoral sorting and gender disparities among workers in similar job types. Lastly, we discuss ramifications for the gender gap in pay.

I. Summer declines in women's employment and hours

We estimate seasonal shifts in labor market activity among US adults aged 25–49 using Current Population Survey (CPS) data spanning the years 1989–2019.⁴ The CPS reports individuals' labor market activity during each month's reference week, which usually coincides with the 12th day of the month.

Figure 2 plots the typical evolution of women's and men's labor force status throughout the year, with all changes expressed relative to the month of May. Between May and July, women's employment-to-population ratio (EPOP) declines by 1.1 percentage points (top panel), whereas men's EPOP edges up slightly (bottom panel).⁵

Figure 2. Seasonal shifts in labor force status, by sex

The summer drop in female employment is driven in equal parts by an increase in unemployment and an increase in labor force non-participation. These seasonal changes are economically meaningful: the May-to-July drop in female EPOP amounts to nearly one-third of its peak-to-trough decline during the Great Recession.

The drop in employment is reinforced by a much steeper decline in women's hours worked, which plunge by 11.2 percent between May and July. Some of this decline stems directly from reduced employment, but most of it reflects absences from work among those who remain continuously employed. Men's hours also decline, but only by 5.2 percent. Although both men and women take time off over the summer, the much bigger drop among women points to summer work patterns as a potential contributor to gender gaps in earnings, as we explore in Section IV below.

II. School closures and childcare disruptions

Why do women work less over the summer? It turns out that a fixture of the US educational system—summer break—is at the root of the decline.

When schools close for the summer, childcare needs change dramatically. Survey data reveal how parents use a patchwork of childcare arrangements to account for the six hours per weekday that their children previously spent in school.⁶ Over 40 percent of working parents pay for summer childcare, including camps and summer school. Other parents lean on relatives for care or have their children look after themselves. Over half of parents report that at least one parent in the household plans to make a job sacrifice to accommodate summer childcare needs. Since women shoulder the lion's share of childcare responsibilities, it is likely that school closures disproportionately affect their employment.⁷

Because schools tend to let out at different times in different states, we can see whether women's drop in employment coincides with the beginning of summer break in their state. For example, most schools in the Midwest, Southwest, and South Atlantic states close by mid-June, while most schools in the Northeast and in Washington State close between mid-June and mid-July.⁸ As shown in Figure 3, the summer drop in female employment is tightly synchronized with the onset of summer break. In early-closure states, women's employment falls sharply between the May and June reference weeks; in late-closure states, their employment instead holds steady through June and falls only in July.

Figure 3. Seasonal shifts in female employment, by timing of school closures

The summer lapse in school-provided childcare matters most for women whose children are old enough to attend school but young enough to require supervision during summer break. As shown in Figure 4, employment among mothers whose youngest child is aged 6–12 declines by fully 2.3 percentage points between May and July. The decline is smaller, though still sizable, among other mothers and among women without children.

Figure 4. Seasonal shifts in female employment, by age of youngest child

Consistent with school closures disrupting an important mode of childcare, mothers of young school-age children report a sharp uptick in time spent on childcare over the summer months. Using data from the American Time Use Survey, we tally up all childcare time—whether it is the mother's primary activity or done alongside another task such as household chores. Childcare time is elevated throughout the summer, rising by nearly 9 hours per week from May to July.⁹

III. The role of education-sector jobs

One might think that the summer drop in employment simply reflects the fact that women are more likely to work in the education sector, where work schedules track the school calendar. But only about a third of the gender gap in summer employment is due to this kind of sorting.¹⁰

More subtle forms of sorting play a role, as well. Within the education sector, women tend to sort into occupations that contract more during the summer months. Outside of education, men are more likely to work in sectors like construction that boom in warmer weather, which sustains their employment rates through the summer months.

All told, however, gender differences in sorting across sectors and occupations can account for only half of the disparity in summer work. The remainder stems from seasonal differences in employment between women and men working in similar jobs. Within narrowly defined occupations in the education sector—such as secondary school teachers or bus drivers—women are more likely than men to exit employment over the summer. Further detail comes from the Schools and Staffing Survey, which shows that female teachers are less likely to engage in school-based summer work, such as teaching classes or coaching sports, and are also less likely to bridge the summer break with work outside the school setting.¹¹ In other sectors, too, women exit employment over the summer at higher rates than their male counterparts. Throughout the labor market, women's employment falls relative to men's when schools are on summer break.

IV. Ramifications for gender gaps in pay

Does the summer drop in female employment contribute to gender gaps in pay? It could do so through several channels. First, women's reduced hours over the summer translate directly into reduced summer earnings. As shown in Figure 5, women's weekly earnings fall by an average of 3.3 percent over the summer months, about five times the decline among men.¹²

Figure 5. Seasonal shifts in weekly earnings, by sex

Second, summer work interruptions may impede women's accumulation of human capital or worsen their odds of promotion. While we do not have direct empirical evidence on this point, prior research on the gender gap has emphasized the importance of continuous employment for earnings growth over the life cycle.¹³ Time spent out of the labor force or working at reduced intensity—notably after childbirth—carries a significant earnings penalty.

Third, women navigating childcare needs may accept lower pay to access jobs that offer flexible summer hours. Education jobs, in particular, offer a unique form of summer flexibility, since their work demands align naturally with the school year.¹⁴ When we examine jobs that are common both in and outside of education, such as administrative assistants or bus drivers, we find that women systematically sort into the education-sector version of the job. Since education jobs pay less than their non-education counterparts, these patterns suggest that women may be trading off compensation for access to summer flexibility.

The summer drops in women's employment, hours, and earnings underscore how schools' closures for summer break may exacerbate gender disparities in the labor market. Policy options such as extending the school year, broadening access to summer school, or increasing government support for summer childcare could potentially address these disparities.

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