Work-Life Balance Dynamics in Spain: When Policies Meet Households and the Workplace
Speaker: Pedro Manuel Bellón Jiménez (Researcher, Universitat Autònoma de Barcelona)
Abstract: Recent family policies, particularly the expansion of paternity leave and the promotion of flexible work arrangements, are often presented as key tools for advancing gender equality, yet their effects remain uneven. This dissertation examines why policy expansion does not automatically produce more egalitarian outcomes by analyzing how work-life balance measures are shaped by the broader organization of work and care during the transition to parenthood. Focusing on Spain, a context that combines a Southern European welfare tradition with rapid policy development alongside the growing consolidation of the dual-earner model, it draws on original FAIRLEAVE data, including a two-wave survey conducted in 2022 and 2023 with a raw sample of 5,234 parents, together with qualitative and experimental components. First, paternity leave expansion facilitates earlier maternal return to employment primarily among couples with more equal earnings, indicating that policy reforms are most effective where household bargaining power is more balanced. Extending this focus on domestic organization, the analysis of parents’ understandings of work-life balance reveals that while mothers and fathers within dual-earner households often share similar diagnoses of structural barriers such as workplace rigidity and work-care schedule misalignment, they continue to approach these challenges from different starting points shaped by gendered responsibilities, social expectations, and workplace norms. These tensions are also reflected in labor market preferences: when considering return to employment after the leave, parents prioritize flexible working conditions over higher salaries or childcare supports, although labor market inequalities continue to shape how such preferences translate into outcomes. Taken together, these findings show that work-life balance cannot be understood only through policies or formal entitlements, but as part of the broader organizational process of paid work and caregiving. This organization is shaped by policy rights, household arrangements, workplace conditions, and gendered expectations, which define what mothers and fathers are effectively able to do and decide after childbirth.
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