María José González

A long history of patriarchy and sexism has shaped every aspect of women’s lives in Spain. However, ideological changes and social policies implemented since the early 1990s have promoted significant gender equality within the family structure. Using data from the Labor Force Survey for the period 1976–2020 and secondary data from different national archives, this chapter contributes to ongoing empirical research on the transformation of gender relations, marriage, and families in Spain. In the chapter, the author illustrates the massive and rapid changes in women’s roles in the labor market and in families that have taken place from the mid-1970s until now. The chapter reflects upon the persistent traces of patriarchal values that still permeate gender relations and institutions in contemporary Spain.

Using two waves of the Generations and Gender Survey for eight European countries, we test under what conditions couples experience high levels of disagreement over time or separate. The results partly support the idea of relative resources, suggesting that a decrease in the status of men in couples (job loss) is significantly associated with high levels of conflict. The transition to high conflict is more frequent when there is a discrepancy between policy and behavior. Social policies designed to meet the needs of working parents in dual-earner couples together with the diffusion of gender egalitarian values can lead to a reduction in unhealthy levels of couple conflict.

Using data from the Spanish Labor Force Survey between 2006 and 2018, we explore whether sexual orientation causes wage differences for partnered women and men in Spain. The study confirms that men in same-sex couples significantly earn less than men in opposite-sex couples, confirming our hypothesis for the “hegemonic masculinity premium.” Women in same-sex couples also outearn women in opposite-sex couples, but this effect disappears after controlling for differences in human capital characteristics. Despite the high degree of social acceptance of homosexuality in Spain, partnered gay men are not able to avoid the negative earnings effects of discrimination in the labor market.

The quality of time dedicated to child care has potentially positive effects on children's life chances. However, the determinants of parental time allocation to child care remain largely unexplored. We assess two main explanations for differences among parents in the amount of time spent with children. The first, based on the relative resources hypothesis, links variation in time spent with children to the relative attributes (occupation, education or income) of one partner with the other. The second, derived from the social status hypothesis, suggests that variation in time spent with children can be attributed to the relative social position of the couple (i.e. higher status couples spend more time with children regardless of within-couple difference). To investigate these questions, we use a sample of parents living in a partnership with children younger than 10 years old from the 2002 to 2003 Spanish Time Use Survey (STUS) (n = 7438). We find little support for the ‘relative resources hypothesis’, although it has some explanatory power on supervisory and routine activities performed with children. Instead, consistent with the ‘social status hypothesis’, we find that time spent on child care is attributable to the social position of the couple, regardless of between-parent differences in income or education. The ‘social status hypothesis’ is especially relevant for explaining the time that parents devote to activities that have a higher potential for the development of the child's cognitive and social capabilities.

Investigació financiada per l'Institut Català de les Dones (2008-2009) i pel Ministeri d'Educació i Ciència (MEC) (projects SEJ2007-62684/SOCI, CSO2008-00654/SOCI and SEJ2007-67569/SOCI)This article tests the assumption that cohabitation makes a difference in the allocation of childcare responsibilities within couples. It has often been assumed that cohabiting individuals are less likely to adhere to traditional gender ideologies than married people, because they tend to have a lower tolerance for poorly functioning relationships, to assign more value to individual freedom, and to base their relationships on egalitarian individualism, rather than on the joint utility maximisation of married couples. So far, however, most studies have focused on the determinants and consequences of being in cohabitation, and have overlooked the gender implications of this living arrangement. Here we explore whether fathers in consensual unions are more prone than fathers in marital unions to share childcare responsibilities with their female partners. We use multilevel regression models for panel data to analyse ECHP in the period between 1996 and 2001. Our sample included around 13,000 couples living in heterosexual partnerships with small children (at least one child below age 13), and yielded around 45,000 observations over this period of time in 10 Western European nations. We found weak evidence of the influence of cohabitation, relative to marriage, on gender equality, but we also discovered that the diffusion of cohabitation at the societal level is associated with a more equal allocation of child care between partners

The paper examines the relationship between family formation (i.e., living with a partner and having children) and women’s occupational career in southern Europe (i.e., Greece, Italy, Portugal and Spain). The relationship is explored by analysing the impact that different family structures and male involvement in caring activities have on women’s early occupational trajectories (i.e., remaining in the same occupational status, experiencing downward or upward mobility, or withdrawing from paid work). This research shows that male involvement in caring activities does not really push women ahead in their career, but the absolute lack of male support seems to negatively affect women’s permanence in paid work. These results apply to all southern European countries except Portugal, where the absolute absence of the partners’ support in caring activities does not seem to alter women’s determination to remain in paid work. The methodology applied consists of the estimation of multinomial logit regression models and the analysis is based on eight waves (1994-2001) of the European Community Household Panel (ECHP).

Résumé Dans cet article, nous examinons les liens entre la formation d’une famille (installation en couple et naissance des enfants) et le parcours professionnel des femmes dans les pays du Sud de l’Europe (Grèce, Italie, Portugal et Espagne). À cette fin, nous analysons l’impact de différents modèles d’organisation de la famille et de différents degrés d’implication des hommes dans la prise en charge des enfants ( caring ) sur la trajectoire professionnelle des femmes au début de leur vie active (maintien de la même situation professionnelle, mobilité ascendante, mobilité descendante, sortie du marché du travail). Il ressort de notre étude que, si l’implication des hommes dans la prise en charge des enfants ne permet pas réellement aux femmes de progresser dans leur carrière, en revanche, leur absence totale de participation semble avoir une incidence négative sur la probabilité des femmes de rester sur le marché du travail. Ces résultats s’appliquent à tous les pays d’Europe du Sud, sauf le Portugal, où l’absence totale de soutien la part du conjoint ne semble pas se répercuter sur la détermination des femmes à continuer de travailler. Sur le plan méthodologique, nous avons estimé des modèles de régression logit multinomiaux et utilisé les données de huit vagues (1994-2001) du Panel européen des ménages (ECHP).