The educational gradient in company-level family policies

Abstract

In this chapter, the educational gradient in access to different organizational work-family policies is examined using unique multilevel survey data from the European Sustainable Workforce Survey covering nine European countries. A total of six different work-family policies are studied, representing working-time arrangements, leaves, and services. By combining information provided by the organization, the direct supervisor, and the employee we show that for all policies, access reported by employees is substantially lower than provision reported by the team managers, which in turn is lower than the provision reported by the HR managers. This points to complex processes in the distribution of information in organizations. Moreover, at the organizational as well as the employee level, higher skilled employees have more access to working-time arrangements. We conclude that the skill gaps in the access to organizational work-family policies identified in this chapter form an important dimension of social inequality in today’s labor market.