Housing Insecurity and Employment Stability: An Investigation of Working Mothers

Background and Purpose: Women comprise half the U.S. labor force, and the majority of these women are mothers. The competing demands of work and motherhood in combination with the gender wage gap strain households – especially for marginalized mothers struggling to meet basic family needs. Housing insecurity in particular exposes families to chaotic, precarious living arrangements that can interfere with ability to secure and maintain stable employment. Workplaces vary widely in terms of flexibility and support for family and child needs, but little is known about this variation or who is at risk for inflexible, unsupportive positions that bring stigma and retaliation. The present study aimed to identify variation in work schedules and supports, as well as the link from housing insecurity to employment experiences in a sample of at-risk mothers.

Methods: Data came from the Future of Families and Child Well-being Study, a longitudinal survey of families with children born 1998-2000 in 20 large American cities. The analytic sample was limited to currently employed mothers at the Year 5 wave, when children were approximately 5 years old (N = 2,434). Missing data were handled using multiple imputation by chained equations (MICE) with predictive mean matching. Latent class analysis identified subtypes of employment stability; multinomial logistic regression estimated links from housing insecurity to class membership.

Results: Three subtypes of employment stability emerged. The largest class, “Full-Time and Stable,” worked regular full-time, weekday schedules at jobs that offered adequate support and flexibility to address family needs. The second class, “Full-Time and Unstable,” was characterized by full-time weekday jobs that were difficult to balance with child and family needs. Finally, the “Part-Time Weekend” class was comprised of mothers who worked supportive and flexible part-time weekend jobs. Housing insecurity increased risk for being in the “Unstable” class relative to the other classes.

Conclusions and Implications: Housing insecurity is a significant barrier to women entering or remaining in the labor force. In the present study, working mothers experienced dramatically differing levels of stability and support; some reported workplaces and schedules that offered adequate flexibility and support for managing child and family needs, whereas others reported workplaces and schedules that significantly contributed to household stress and struggles. A small portion worked part-time jobs that allowed mothers to balance work and family needs. Housing insecurity thus increases risk for mothers working in high stress, inflexible, unsupportive environments that impede efforts to manage competing demands of work and parenting; the precarity of housing insecurity threatens stable employment and further embeds vulnerability. Identifying and intervening on housing insecurity can promote stable employment. Policies that provide mothers with adequate flexibility to manage childcare needs and reduce family stress may buffer the ongoing financial impacts of housing insecurity.