FAMILIES

Family allowances as well as fiscal rebates for families (based on the number of children) have been in place since the 1930s. In addition to the family allowances, which form an important part of the income of small families, collective facilities (nurseries, kindergarten, infant schools, schools open in the afternoons, and canteens) have been since the 1960s widely available, allowing child care from an early age and at a low cost or even free of charge. Consequently, pre-primary education has been fostered; France shows one of the best performances in international surveys. This network of allowances and facilities, together with other parts of social security, social housing and so on, seems to successfully prevent child poverty. These policies have been very effective, contributing to a rather satisfactory demographic situation, in particular in comparison with other European countries. Such policies also have enabled women to enter the labor market, where they represent nearly half of the workforce.

Labor market participation by women is among the highest in the world, at above 70% and is only slightly lower than male participation. However, there is clear gender segregation in the labor market, with much of the increase in women’s employment rates coming in the form of public sector and/or part-time jobs. The fertility rate is near to two children per woman, thereby just below the replacement rate, and at the very top end of fertility in Europe.
Family policy is oriented toward promoting equal opportunity and equitable representation of women in leadership positions, such as in political and business settings. There is a 12-month maternal/paternal leave that provides parents with 80% of their salary. Six of the weeks are reserved for the father. These reforms have increased the involvement of the father in the first year of the baby (about 90% of fathers now take these six weeks).
Government policy treats married and non-married couples in a nondiscriminatory way. For instance, tax declarations for labor income are filed individually, irrespective of whether a citizen is married or not. Informal cohabitation, as compared to formal marriage, is widespread. Almost all new unions start in informal cohabitation and about half of children are born to unmarried parents. Although one in 10 children are born to single mothers, and institutional support for these women (e.g., day care and cash transfers) is stronger than in most countries.

The basic idea in Swedish family policy is that the public sector should provide daycare for pre-school children and that there should be a parental insurance system that allows parents to take about a year off from work when a baby is born. These support systems have long been in place. There has been a sustained debate between the parties on the left and those on the right about whether there should also be a public subsidy (a so-called “vårdnadsbidrag”) for parents who choose to stay at home with their children.
The current center-right government advocates such a subsidy. The leftist opposition parties argue that such a subsidy will effectively prevent the mother from continuing her professional career after she has had a baby. Since women usually have a lower salary than men it would be much more common for women to use the subsidy than men, the argument goes. The government’s response to this critique has been that the subsidy facilitates choice, something which the parental leave insurance does not. In conclusion, the center-right government introduced a framework legislation that opened the way for the communes to introduce such schemes. Hence, it remains to be seen how many women or men will use this new scheme. In both models, the government’s family policy programs are generous by any international comparison.
It should be noted that family policy in Sweden is viewed in the context of gender policy, i.e. to what extent different family policy programs also promote gender equality. The current government has introduced a one-month extension of the paid parental leave, provided the father uses it. Today, about 50 percent of fathers go on parental leave for some time. However, only somewhat less than a third of the total parental leave support goes to men. Thus, women still use the parental leave program to a much larger extent than men. Despite these reservations, Swedish family policy is still in many aspects a model for other OECD countries.

Publicly subsidized child care is extensive but not universal (there are slightly fewer available spots than babies, but this problem is more acute in areas with higher employment rates), and it is relatively easy to take maternity leave or a part-time job enabling the combination of family life and work. A growing number of parents are taking advantage of these programs, but men do so to a far lesser extent, which reinforces the glass-ceiling problems in women’s careers. In cultural terms, as compared to several other Northern European countries (certainly the Netherlands and Nordic countries), gender role perceptions and practices in Belgium are still more traditional. On the positive side, an increasing proportion of firms and administrations provide incentives and programs aimed at ameliorating these gender biases.
Children can access pre-primary or primary schools beginning at three years of age, and these schools typically provide child care activities until 6 p.m. at very low cost. This allows parents to hold full-time jobs when their children are three years old or more. There is currently a law proposed that would make schooling compulsory as of five years of age.

Danish family policy is well-received. The country’s system of day-care centers, crèches and kindergartens allow sufficient flexibility for both parents to work. Indeed, female employment in Denmark is among the highest in OECD countries. Comparative research also shows that men in Nordic countries tend to contribute more to work at home than do men in many other countries. The system of parental leave, in connection with childbirth, is relatively generous and men also have parental leave rights.

It is not just the government, including government municipalities that are in charge of day care facilities, which contribute to better family policy. Social parties and business have roles to play.

The great majority of children attend daycare facilities in Denmark. In 2006, 90.7% of children aged three to five attended some kind of preschool institution, compared to the OECD average of 73.49%. Such facilities are regarded as an indispensable public service. There has been a large expansion in the number of preschools in recent years.

The state contributes to the expense of raising children by offering financial support and child care arrangements, including a family leave system as well as maternity grants, child maintenance support, child care allowance, subsidized day care and so on. While such efforts have practically eradicated child poverty, the fertility rate has for some time not been encouraging and the number of families with children has declined. In 2008, however, a turning point in fertility was reached as the largest number of babies in the 10 preceding years was born. As female employment is high, family policy has not yet fully succeeded in solving the challenge of how to combine parenting and employment. The erosion of a traditional family structure in recent years has certainly added to the difficulties, creating single-parent households in which the mother or father works full-time. Primary child care responsibility still falls to women, and mothers opt for part-time employment more often than do fathers. Policies encouraging more men to opt for parental leave are therefore needed, as are more flexible child care options for parents working full-time. In the face of municipal austerity it has been discussed whether the right for child care should be restricted only to parents who are employed. So far, the Ministry of Social Affairs and Health adheres to the universal right on child care after parental leave.

Icelandic family policy has long supported the participation of women in the labor force. In a comparative perspective, Iceland indeed has one of the world’s highest rates of labor market participation by women. The government’s family policy has encouraged men and women to share the burden of child rearing. For example, in 2005, almost 90% of eligible fathers used their right to take a three-month parental leave. As a consequence of the collapse in 2008, and as a part of the ensuing economic crisis, state payments during parental leave have been reduced from 80% of an individual’s salary to 75%. The ceiling for this payment was also lowered. Since men have on average higher wages than women, this reduction in payment levels could discourage men from taking parental leave.

Childcare has significantly improved over recent years in terms of provision and quality. In 2004, the state and municipalities secured the care of 7,481 children. In 2008, this number increased to 23,000, and it is predicted to further increase by more than a third to respond to the demand created by a new original measure to promote equal opportunities for children living in Luxembourg. This measure, established on March 1, 2009, is called the “child care voucher.” Each child under 13 years is entitled to free out-of-school care for 3 hours per week and 21 hours at a greatly reduced cost. This benefit focuses mainly on communal day care centers, which care for children after school until their parents finish work, but the voucher can also be used for other activities (relating to sports, culture etc.). This measure is restricted to resident parents and could be considered to discriminate against transborder commuters. The female employment rate has impressively progressed from 53.8% in 2000 to 61.3% in 2009.

Female participation in the labor market is comparatively high. At the same time the fertility rate is one of the highest in the OECD area. The government’s generous family policy has contributed to this, with a number of measures over recent years. However, this should not mask the fact that the participation of women in arenas beyond the workplace, including in politics, is still well below that of men.

The labor force participation rate for women whose children were all under six years of age in Canada was 70.5% in 2006, up from 69.8% in 2001. This is high by international standards, and suggests that policies may have contributed to this situation. One key policy has been the enrichment of the child tax credit, which has reduced the barriers associated with the so-called welfare wall. In the past, when single parents, mostly women, left welfare, they lost all income benefits for their children. With the integration of the welfare system with the universal, income-tested child tax credit, there is now less disincentive to leave welfare and enter the labor market.
Canada does not have a universal child care system, and the absence of such a system may make it more difficult for some women to combine parenting and employment. As a substitute for such a child care system, the current government introduced the Universal Child Care program, which provides families with children under six years with CAD 100 per month per child on a non-income-tested basis. However, this level of financial support would normally cover only a small proportion of child care expenses, and hence has likely had very little effect in fostering labor force participation.
Two policies that might encourage women to combine parenting with labor force participation are the compulsory proration of employer benefits for part-time workers and the right of a full-time employee to work part-time after a certain duration of employment. The first policy could increase the rate of return to part-time work, while the second policy could realign the preferences of many women for part-time work with available jobs, as it would allow women who did not want to work full time to stay in the labor force. However, neither policy is currently in place in Canada.

Family policy in the Netherlands is characterized by the need to recognize a child’s best interest, and to provide support for the family and the development of parenting skills. Day care centers for young children are not directly subsidized, but parents face considerable transaction costs. The subsidy depends on the taxable income and is a result of the Childcare Act that came into effect in 2005. Until 2011, the government invests €2.65 billion extra in child care. The government established an extensive system of child protection.

From January 2009 on, parental leave was extended from 13 to 26 weeks. According to the OECD, around two-thirds of Dutch working women choose part-time jobs, which bring down the country´s average working time to one of the lowest in the OECD. Next to individual preferences, there is a strong link between the incidence of part-time work to taxation and childcare. Although government decisions have facilitated the provision of childcare services and cost reductions, not all obstacles have been removed yet. Full-time female participation is hindered mainly by a high marginal effective tax burden on second earners, reflecting the withdrawal of social benefits conditioned on family income.

The Labour government was strongly focused on improving women’s ability to combining parenting with participation in the labor market. A number of programs were designed to help improve the situation in this specific area, including the Working Families Tax Credit and the “New Deal for Lone Parents.” The provision of much more extensive childcare facilities, the substantial extension of maternity leave and the introduction of a paternity leave (though limited, certainly compared with arrangements in Nordic countries) have all been measures contributing to this goal, and as a consequence spending on family policy now ranks highly among overall social expenditure programs.

Although female labor force participation is high in the United Kingdom, specific areas remain problematic. The share of jobless (unemployed or inactive) one-parent households with dependent children (44% in 2002), has declined substantially as employment rates for single parents have increased, but remains a focus of attention. In December 2009, the Office of National Statistics reported that the employment rate among single parents was 58%, some 16% below the rate for all people; but this also represented a near-halving of the gap since the late 1990s. Improvements in child benefits have also been used as part of the government’s post-crisis fiscal stimulus package, and the same is true of tax measures and tax credits designed to help working families with children.

Government family policy in recent years has tended towards a part-time employment ideal for women with dependent children. Since the Labor government was elected in November 2007, somewhat greater emphasis has been placed on promoting the employment of mothers, mainly via an increase in child care subsidies. Part-time employment nonetheless remains the dominant form of employment for women with dependent children, whether partnered or single.

A constant theme in public discussion is that the quantity of available child care facilities is not adequate, at least in some regions. Research shows the total stock of facilities is sufficient, but it also shows that availability and cost of child care are key factors influencing mothers’ – in particular single mothers’ – labor market participation decisions, and that many women do not believe they have access to satisfactory care at a reasonable price. The private sector provides slightly more than half of the available facilities, although many of the private sector providers are small businesses operating in a manner similar to community-sector and local government centers.

In 2009, a Senate Committee recommended a fundamental review of child care provision, including the establishment of a statutory body, to provide advice on child care policy. The government has not yet responded to this recommendation.


In May 2009, the federal government announced the introduction of a government-funded paid parental leave (PPL) scheme to commence on January 1, 2011, which is to promote mothers’ employment participation and improve care of young children. A government inquiry in 2007 found that around 54% of female employees and 50% of male employees had access to some form of PPL. The government scheme will therefore considerably expand access to PPL in the community. The legislation to enact the scheme passed the House of Representatives on June 1, 2010, and is expected to be passed by the Senate.

Improving the compatibility of employment and parenthood has recently been high on the German political agenda. This objective has been addressed through a variety of initiatives. In 2008, an entitlement for a place in a child care facility for children below the age of three was introduced, to take effect in 2013. To date, this entitlement has only covered children beginning at age three. Another instrument is the parental leave benefit introduced in 2007 under the grand coalition. Child care facilities are heavily subsidized, with a trend even toward the free provision of services in many federal states. Transfers toward families through various mechanisms are substantial, such as through the free insurance coverage of children in the statutory health insurance program.
The family policy of the new CDU/CSU and FDP government is much more in flux than that of the grand coalition. This is mainly due to a change in the minister in charge of this area. The incoming minister, 32-year-old Kristina Schröder, initially tried to extend the period for parental leave from 14 to a maximum of 16 months. However, this was promptly rejected by the Ministry of Finance due to additional costs of about €250 million. She then tried to introduce a two-year part-time work benefit associated with caretaking, with participants receiving 75% of their former income. Under the proposal, worker would have to work full-time for two additional years, continuing at 75% of their previous wage. However, employer’s organizations strongly criticized the plan, as they would have to bear the financial risks of layoffs during the two periods. Furthermore, Schröder announced that the so-called child care subsidy could be paid out in the form of vouchers for learning opportunities. According to the coalition agreement, this is planned to start in 2013 for parents who raise their children at home. The deal would see parents receiving €150 per month in child care benefits for children under three years of age. However, the proposal was vehemently rejected by the FDP; the CSU and parts of the CDU also strongly opposed the voucher idea. Currently, the budget consolidation debate also relates to family-related expenditures.
Taken together, the recent innovations show that German politics takes the objective of combining parenting with labor market participation very seriously. Whether the new instruments will help to raise the country’s fertility rates remains to be seen. The high and income-related subsidy for parental leave can be criticized as producing windfall gains for wealthy young academics, and its cost-benefit analysis is controversial. According to an estimate by the Ministry for Family Affairs, Senior Citizens, Women and Children, Germany spends € 250 billion, with effects that remain largely unclear. The birth rate remains at the same low level as in years before, and no evaluation of the huge amount of money spent on family policies has taken place. However, the ministries of Finance and Family have agreed to delay evaluating the effects of the family policies until 2013.

The Irish income tax system incorporates a principle of “individualization,” which means that at any given level of combined income, the tax burden is lower on households in which both spouses are employed outside the home than in those in which only one spouse works outside the home. To give a specific example, under the 2010 budget, a household with two children and an annual income of €60,000 pays €14,400 in taxes when all the income is from one earner, but only €9,000 if there are two income earners in the household. (A single person earning €60,000 faces a tax bill of €19,020.)
The tax code therefore generates incentives for spouses to take up employment outside the home. However, the progressive structure of the income tax system implies in many cases that a second partner entering paid employment faces a 43% marginal tax rate plus an additional 6% social insurance levy. Importantly, child care expenses are not deductible against taxable income. In reality, then, significantly less than half of the gross earnings of the second earner would be taken home in after-tax, after-expenses income.
Child benefits are payable for families with dependent children, standing currently at €150 a month for the first two children (with higher rates for subsequent children). In the 2010 budget, the “early child care supplement” previously payable for pre-school-age children was removed, but increased provision for early schooling was introduced.
Although children are not obliged to attend school until the age of six, 65% of four-year-olds and most five-year-olds are enrolled in the infant classes in primary schools in Ireland.
The current economic crisis has had a more severe impact on employment opportunities for men than for women, as is to be expected in view of the collapse in employment in the construction sector and the relative stability of employment in services (including public services). Male employment has fallen by 15% from its peak in 2007, but female employment is down by only 4%. The labor force participation rate among women has held up in the recession – it is now close to 55% compared to only 50% in 2005. At the same time, the Irish birth rate (and fertility rate) has remained stable at a relatively high level, despite the worsening economic situation.

Government family support programs in the United States are far less generous than those in other industrial countries. The Family and Medical Leave Act, which requires employers with at least fifty workers to allow twelve weeks of unpaid leave for child care, is not a very ambitious program. In order to make child care available to low- and moderate-income families and thereby facilitate entry into the labor market, the Obama administration has increased by $2 billion support through the Child Care and Development Fund (CCDF), a block grant going to state governments. In its 2011 budget proposal, the Obama administration has also proposed to double the child and dependent care tax credit, which could reach up to $6,000 per household. In addition to federal tax breaks, there are myriad state and local programs helping women to make work and raising children compatible. In addition, private and public employers who want to retain female workers have increased flex-time and part-time working arrangements. But in reality, the compatibility of work and family for women is greatly facilitated by flexible private arrangements based on the availability of immigrant women for child care services. Despite this very patchy picture, the United States enjoys an exceptional birth rate among industrial countries–close to the replacement level, at 2.04 births per woman for the current decade–a circumstance that is not accounted for exclusively by the higher birth rates among immigrants.

Family policy continues to divide parties and politics. There is a prevailing consensus that women (and, of course, men) should have the full freedom of combining job and family. However, the infrastructure needed to provide this freedom is not in place, especially in terms of all-day childcare facilities.
The coalition government has expressed support for the idea that every child should have free access to a year of pre-school, which would improve opportunities for (especially) mothers to remain in (or re-enter) the labor market. Steps have been taken to lengthen preschool education, many new preschool groups have been started, and in some parts of the country, at-school meals for preschoolers are also offered for free.
The implications of these steps are profound, especially given the absence of all-day childcare infrastructure: Austria’s fertility rate among women aged 15-49 is about 1.41; while in France, a country known for its well-developed childcare infrastructure, fertility rates are close to 2.1 (the number necessary for holding a population level constant).

The Bachelet government made substantial efforts to establish broad coverage for preschool education. This gives Chilean mothers more opportunity to work, while leaving their children in nurseries and kindergartens. Chilean family policies evidently fail to fully respect the rights of fathers, as women still more often win custody of children after divorce. Recent surveys show that more than 50% of children born in Chile are unwanted. As these children are concentrated to a large extent among young single-mother households and the poor, this high rate perpetuates poverty. It reflects a lack of widespread and effective family planning programs.

The employment rate for women in the Czech Republic is the highest among the post-socialist member states of the OCED, but does not exceed the OECD average. The level of child care provision declined significantly during the nineties, and there has been no significant improvement since, even though the growing number of single mothers – more than one-third of children are now born outside of wedlock in the Czech Republic – has further increased the demand for child care. Another problem has been the rather long maximum duration of maternity and paid parental leave (28 weeks in the case of maternity leave, up to four years in the case of parental leave), which has reduced the incentives for early reentry into the labor market. Debates on family policy have paid relatively little attention to the issue of labor market integration for women, focusing rather on the level of parental leave benefits and family and children allowances. The Topolánek government cut the level of parental leave benefits, which had been increased by its social-democratic predecessor, by approximately 20%. After a heated debate in the Chamber of Deputies in late 2009 and early 2010, benefits were restored to their former value by parliament. However, this legislation was vetoed by President Klaus in April 2010.

A major focus for family policy in Japan in recent years has been the attempt to improve the ability of women to balance work and family. According to the most recent OECD statistics, Japan has the group’s second-highest gender gap in terms of median incomes earned by fulltime employees, for instance. Although several policy measures aimed at addressing this issue have been implemented since the 1990s, challenges have remained quite severe. With respect to the sharing of housework and child care duties, for instance, studies have shown little has changed since the mid-1990s: Fathers and husbands still spend little time on housework and child care, even during weekends.

The new DPJ-led government has shown itself determined to introduce more tangible policies. As an election pledge, the DPJ promised monthly payments of 26,000 yen (roughly €200) for each new child up to the age of 15, along with the introduction of more state-supported day-care facilities, tuition waivers and other measures. As the reporting period closed, the government was about to introduce half of the monthly payment program. However, the country’s difficult fiscal situation has led to some debate as to whether the expensive program will be effective, and whether it can be financed to the full.

Attitudes toward family structures are in the process of changing, but more rapidly in the case of upper- and middle-class women than for their poorer counterparts. In wealthier families, it is quite normal for women to seek highly paid employment and to avail themselves of private sources of nursery education as well as maids. As a result, many professional people, such as university professors, are women. Poorer Mexicans tend to have larger families and face fewer opportunities for women in the labor market. Old-fashioned “macho” and conservative Catholic attitudes are slowly dying, but there is an inertial effect from the past that makes it harder for lower-class women to progress. Many labor-based institutions tend to be based for traditional reasons around the concept of the working man. Lower-class women are more active in family businesses and in the informal sector of the economy, where incomes tend to be lower. Women are further handicapped by weak law enforcement, because they can be vulnerable to various kinds of abuse without being able to rely on the protection of the laws.
Some of what might be called official Mexico is broadly supportive of women’s rights. The recent political reform requires registered political parties to have a quota of women included as a part of their election slates. Other issues are more contentious, particularly ones that involve the Catholic Church. The Federal District has recently officially legalized abortion (a decision so far upheld by the Supreme Court despite many challenges), although this remains illegal in the majority of Mexican states.

Female employment is below the OECD average. While the previous government had subscribed to a traditional male breadwinner model (matka polka), the Tusk government has sought to improve the labor market integration of women and foster a more balanced division of labor among the sexes. The government has undertaken some attempts at expanding child care facilities, which are among the most limited in the OECD. In particular, it has used EU funds for improving child care facilities in rural areas. An amendment to parental leave legislation in 2008 expanded the rights of parents to reduce their working time, introduced a special paternity leave, and improved opportunities for mothers to grant unused maternity leave to their husbands. Given the limited child care density, lowering the mandatory preschool age from six to five years of age and the mandatory school age from seven to six years of age will likely have a positive effect on female employment.

In Hungary, traditional notions of the family have been strong, with the female employment ratio being one of the lowest in the OECD. The Gyurcsány and the Bajnai governments stressed their emphasis on improving female labor market participation and the reconciliation of employment and work. When the Bajnai government cut the maximum duration of paid parental leave from three to two years in 2009, it cited fiscal reasons as well as the disincentives such policies entail for female employment. In large part due to electoral reasons, the main emphasis in family policy rested on combating child poverty through improvements in family allowances.

The hard realities of the economy and the labor market typically prevent women from combining parenting with successful participation in the labor market. Due to the rigidity of the labor market, potential employers are unwilling to hire women who are likely to become pregnant. Or, if they have been hired and do not have a long-term contract, they will be let go. Mothers are legally entitled to four months of parental leave at 100% of earnings, or five months at 80% (fathers may also be entitled to part of this, should the couple so decide). The fertility rate continues to be low, standing at an average of 1.4 children per woman in 2008 (a modest gain vis-à-vis the results reported in the SGI 2009 report). The government has not provided targeted resources aimed at increasing female employment, so women’s salaries and unemployment levels are worse than those of males. For example, although the proportion of women in higher education is now higher than that of men, this advantage is not recognized or rewarded by employers, and women’s situation is actually worsening. Whereas women held 33.9% of the “upper category” (quadros superiores) positions in the job market in 2005, this figure had fallen to 31.4% by 2009. It was only with regard to lower-skilled positions that this percentage increased.
Furthermore, whereas 44.3% of female Portuguese workers were unemployed or held precarious employment in 2009, some 40.6% of men were in that situation. In the last quarter of 2009, 26.8% of unemployed women had been unemployed for more than a year, as opposed to some 22.8% of men.
In the SGI 2009 report, we highlighted the Sócrates government’s commitment to increasing number of child care places for children between three months and three years of age. This goal was one focus of the Program to Widen the Network of Social Equipment (Programa de Alargamento da Rede de Equipamentos Sociais, PARES), which was launched in March 2006 and was to last through 2009. However, the PARES program has not met its goals. In February 2010, the government estimated that it would cover 36% of needs by the end of that year. The PARES program had aimed at building 400 new child care facilities with a capacity of more than 18,000 children. Of these, only 100 were in operation by the end of 2009, though the government estimates that a further 180 to 200 “may also start operating” by the end of 2010. Coverage thus remains insufficient.

In Slovakia, traditional notions of the family are still rather strong. Mothers of children under two years rarely work, maternal employment rates are below the OECD average, and working women face an enormous double burden of both professional and domestic responsibilities. This situation is reinforced by the low incidence of part-time employment, income tax splitting and the relatively long duration of parental leave. Child care facilities are limited and have not kept up with the increase in birth rates. The lack of kindergarten slots is felt in larger towns in particular. The family policy of the Fico government focused on improving the financial situation of families with children through the increase of different family and child benefits. However, the government did not pursue a consistent strategy to improve the reconciliation of employment with family and the inclusion of women into the labor market. The abolition of fees for the last pre-school year was too small and isolated of a measure to make a difference.

Although the government’s Plan E includes a set of measures intended to support families and alleviate economic difficulties, few of these target women in particular. On the other hand, the “cheque bebe” (a €2,500 benefit payable to families for every newborn or adopted child) remains in place, although it may be eliminated in the near future). Some autonomous regions (such as Madrid and Asturias) have already suppressed or decreased their additional contribution to the cheque.
The Ministry of Employment is pursuing a campaign to ensure employers’ compliance with legislation on wage equality, and discourages any form of discrimination in the workplace. Subsidies for maternity leave have been extended. Nevertheless, the paternity leave program receives minimal use, and further measures are needed to instill a culture of shared responsibility for child care. The moratorium in implementing the National System of Dependency (care of dependent people) does not make it easy for women to free themselves from the burden of family care. In general, timid governmental action and traditional gender roles deeply rooted in Spanish society keep women in an unequal position. The wage gap between men and women is 17% and the pension gap comes close to 20%. Women’s employment rate is 51%, as compared to 68% for men.

In Greece, the extended family remains a prime provider of social support, including housing, health care, child care and transfers to any unemployed or socially excluded family members. The persistence of extended family networks is probably responsible for the comparatively low incidence of child poverty (which in the mid-2000s was 13.2% in Greece compared to an OECD average of 12.4% among children aged one to 17 years). The functioning of these networks as a cushion against child and family hardship has also provided an excuse for not devoting more public funds to child care. Despite the high number of nursery school teachers, state-owned and local-government-managed nurseries are insufficient to cover the needs of the population. The same holds true of kindergartens. These patterns are evident in the very low enrollment rate of three-to-five-year-olds in Greek formal preschool services, as OECD data show.
Support policies for women who want to combine parenting and employment are generous for women employed in the public sector, but slim in the private sector, where pressure from employers and the absence of state-owned child care facilities create an impasse for young mothers. In brief, as in the past, Greek family and child policies remained underdeveloped – that is, underfunded and not equitable –throughout this period of review.

Italian society has traditionally relied very much upon its very strong family institutions. The family (often in its extended version) today remains a major provider of welfare for its weakest components (children, young couples with precarious jobs and elders). Within the family, significant amounts of monetary redistribution take place, and important services are provided (see for instance the role of grandparents in the care of preschool age children). Partly because of this reliance, family support policies have been generally weak. Apart from relatively generous rules on maternity leave (paid for by social insurance) and limited tax deductions for children, the state has not offered much. Public day care facilities for preschool children are available on a limited scale (and vary significantly across regions); and private firms and public offices have only recently started offering similar services, with some support from the state.
The lack of more significant policies has contributed on one hand to the limited participation of women in the workforce, and on the other to very low birth rate (except in the immigrant population).
In its 2008 program, the Berlusconi government proposed to introduce important changes in the tax treatment of families (the “quoziente familiare”), but these ideas were put aside during the crisis, and the government has to date introduced only limited subsidies for families and children in the lowest income brackets.
New and innovative Scandinavian-style concepts which go beyond maternity allowance (such as parental leave) are not widely used. The whole child care sector, and indeed the state of the public debate over the ability of women to combine work and children, lags behind that of the wealthier European countries.

As with preceding governments, the Lee administration has not been very effective in enabling women to combine parenting with participation in the labor market. This can be seen in the country’s low fertility rate as well as in women’s low labor-market participation rate. The traditional Confucian family values that view women as mothers and housewives remain strongly influential. High housing prices and high costs of education are the most important factors in young couples’ decision not to have children. In recent years, the government has been alarmed by the dramatic drop in fertility, and various policies are under way or under discussion; however, most policies adopted thus far have proved inadequate in helping women combine employment and parenthood. For example, the government is currently discussing the introduction of a child benefit system. There have also been more controversial reactions to the low fertility rate. For example, the government has started cracking down on abortions, which are illegal in South Korea but had been tolerated since the 1970s, when Korea was trying to bring down its birth rate.

In international comparison, Swiss family policy offers relatively little benefit to women. In a recent analysis on the ability to reconcile work and family, Switzerland scored lowest among 21 OECD nations for 2005 (Thoenen 2010). The new federal law on family subsidies, which took effect in January 2009, is unlikely to change much in international comparison; nor will it change the substantial cantonal variation, one of the most salient characteristics of Swiss family policy. The new federal law defines minimum child and education benefits, and cantons may add a variable amount to this basic federal benefit level.
Swiss family policy has a clearly conservative outlook with a strong liberal undertone. Basically Swiss family policy is mildly supportive to the traditional family; there are some tax deductions and a period of parental leave offered to mothers (but not to fathers), as well as a very limited amount of child care facilities. As is virtually always true in Switzerland, there are substantial cantonal variations. The canton of Ticino has a very generous family policy, which helps mothers to reconcile work and family; other cantons (and their municipalities) fail to offer any substantial help such as child care facilities on a broad scale. Likewise, tax disincentives to stay at home or to reenter the labor market vary from canton to canton. However, taking the median canton and municipality, the portrait of a liberal-conservative family policy applies. These policies create incentives for young mothers to stay at home during the first years of their children’s lives. Afterwards, mothers have a reasonable opportunity to get a job; however, these are in most cases part-time jobs. This allows mothers to care for their children, but also to take up some limited employment. Taking part-time jobs usually reduces the chance to have a career, as compared to the opportunities offered by full-time jobs. Hence, the system works in the sense that it mobilizes women within the labor market, but without giving them fair and equal chances for income and career advancement as compared to men.

Traditional extended families and nuclear families are the two most common types of families in Turkey. The traditional extended family, in which married couples live together with other relatives, usually the parents or other relations of the husband, is becoming increasingly rare today. With industrialization and urbanization, the nuclear family, consisting of a husband, wife and unmarried children, is replacing traditional family groupings. A survey conducted by the Directorate General for Family and Social Research and the Turkish Statistical Institute during 2006 revealed that the average household size had decreased from 4.5 persons in 2000 to 4 persons in 2006. While the average value for urban regions is 3.7 persons, it is about 4 in rural areas, and the average household size increases with the move from western Anatolia to eastern Anatolia.
Regarding the position of women in society, it can be said that unless the woman is living in a metropolitan city and financially independent, life will be bound by the customs of traditional family life. Society and the government seem to vacillate between strategies aimed at granting women particular protection in the working world and more straightforwardly fostering women’s employment. In November 2008, the Constitutional Court ruled that women may quit their work in the year after their marriage and still receive the remuneration normally paid only in cases of dismissal. The ruling is beneficial to women, but at the same time bears the risk that women will be hired less often because their employment creates additional costs. A similar dilemma occurred in early 2010, when the government added the whole textile sector, which employs women in great number, into the category of dangerous and heavy labor, and granted women in the textile industry a five-day menstrual leave every month. On the other hand, to encourage the employment of women, the government removed the employers’ duty to open day-care centers.
Some 30% of children in the 3 to 6-year-old age group attend preschool education, and in 30 of Turkey’s 81 provinces, the preschool attendance reaches 40%. This represents a significant rise in preschool education rates in comparison with the last SGI report. For the 2010 – 2011 period, the government is even considering making preschool education obligatory in a number of pilot provinces. However, only two of the provinces with extraordinary high preschool education attendance (Tunceli and Kilis) are located in primarily Kurdish and Arabic provinces of the disadvantaged southeast.
The existing child care centers and nurseries are not adequate to demand. Private nursery schools are expensive and generally unaffordable for blue-collar workers and even for many white-collar workers.