Why is Mommy So Stressed?

Misty L. Heggeness, Ph.D. 02/09/2021

The pandemic has been tough on all of us, but it has hit working moms extra hard. Dr. Misty Heggeness, Principal Economist and Sr. Advisor for Evaluation & Experiments at the US Census Bureau, sees it clearly in the stats. We talked to her about the impact of COVID-19 on women in the workforce, how gender equality is impacting our health – and what we need to do to move mountains for working women. Dr. Heggeness shared her thoughts on her working paper entitled, “Why is Mommy so Stressed? Estimating the Immediate Impact of the COVID-19 Shock on Parental Attachment to the Labor Market and the Double Bind of Mothers”. Why is your topic important to study? Our society has yet to achieve gender equality…

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Categories: Institute of Women, Wellness & Work

Tags: health, Mom Life, self-care, stress, Stress Management, wellness

Misty L. Heggeness, Ph.D.

working from home; working moms need to prioritize their health

7 Tips to Help Working Moms Prioritize Our Health

Working moms need to prioritize our health. With many of us heading back to the office and yet another change to our routines is disrupting our lives, our overall wellbeing is suffering. Add balancing your job with motherhood — childcare, packing lunches, dishes, laundry, and more — it is critical that we make time for self-care and move our health to the top of our priority list. Many working moms avoid or even forget about self-care because they simply don’t have time for it. If this sounds familiar, stay tuned. These simple tips will allow you to put your health at the top of your to-do list without finding extra time for it. Why It’s Important for Working Moms to Prioritize Our Health Oftentimes, we…

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Institute Editorial Team 08/09/2021

The “Mommy Wars” in a Post-Pandemic World: The Battle We Need to Move Beyond

In the past few decades, few topics have been as polarizing among women as the “Mommy Wars.” The age-old debate between stay-at-home and working mothers about who is making the “right” choices has been a significant point of contention. With the advent of the COVID-19 pandemic, these conversations took on new dimensions, intensifying in some quarters while drawing the need for unity and understanding in others. Let’s explore the evolution of the “Mommy Wars” in the post-pandemic era and why it’s more crucial than ever for women to rise above the fray. Mommy Wars: Pre-Pandemic and Now Before the pandemic, the “Mommy Wars” often revolved around the supposed superiority of one parenting style or choice over another. Working mothers faced criticism for “neglecting” family, while…

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Institute Editorial Team 08/14/2023

African American woman sitting at desk representing the many women who are leading the great resignation

The State of Women in the Workforce

PRE-PANDEMIC: Progress for Women was Slow with Many Challenges While there was a minor upward shift for women in senior positions, women continued to be drastically underrepresented in leadership positions, especially women of color.The “broken rung” continued holding millions of women back from being promoted to manager.Women remained significantly outnumbered in entry-level management with only 38% of positions.Women’s participation in the labor force had not yet returned to its 2000 peak by the time the coronavirus pandemic began (McKinsey 2020). THE SHECESSION 100% of jobs lost in December 2020 were held by women.275,000 women left the workforce in January 2021.Mothers who are reducing their work hours and leaving the labor force outright add up to $64.5 billion a year in lost wages and economic activity.The net 2.4 million women who left the labor force…

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Institute Editorial Team 08/14/2021

COVID-19: For Women It’s One Step Forward, 30 Steps Back

We came across an interesting study by Dr. Gema Zamarro and her colleagues entitled “Gender Differences in the Impact of COVID-19”. Dr. Zamarro is a Professor and 21st Century Endowed Chair in Teacher Quality in the Department of Education Reform at the University of Arkansas. We invited Dr. Zamarro to discuss how the research brief findings are relevant to working women. Below are her responses. Why is your topic important to study? The current COVID-19 crisis has the potential to drastically magnify gender gaps in terms of both childcare arrangements and work. With its social-distancing requirements, the COVID-19 pandemic had its biggest effect on more female-dominated sectors of the service industry and as a result, in contrast to other economic crises that affected more male employment,…

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Gema Zamarro, Ph.D. 09/24/2020

Women in Today’s Workplace: Two Steps Forward, One Step Back?

The post-pandemic workplace is littered with uncertainty for workers in all industries, especially women. While the brunt of the COVID-19 pandemic has passed, the lack of a steady workplace for women is still a prevalent problem. COVID-19 and Women’s Employment During the COVID-19 pandemic, women were 33% more likely than men to work in an industry shut down by the pandemic. Research indicated that jobs held by women were 1.8 times more vulnerable than those held by males. Women made up 39% of the employment on a global scale, but they accounted for 54% of the job losses worldwide. Economists also report that women were much more likely than men to be furloughed during the pandemic. In addition, women were furloughed for longer periods than…

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Gina Messina, Ph.D. 09/12/2022

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