Being on call for teenagers is the missing piece in the gender pay gap debate

The “child penalty” phenomenon describes how women’s working hours and income change after they have a baby. This knowledge has helped drive government support for parents of pre-school children. However, a mother’s work continues beyond their children’s early years. Almudena Sevilla shows that even once the hands-on childcare years have passed, mothers spend twice as much time as fathers “on call”, providing supervision and support to their teenagers.