Work-life balance, gender and inclusion: can skills help?

The link between education and skills development, gender balance and equality came under the spotlight Thursday (February 9, 2023) in the European Training Foundation’s latest ‘Learning Connects’ livestream.

The regular weekly sessions are used by the ETF to give participants from around the world a chance to delve into core issues that impact the world of education, training and skills – particularly as it affects the ETF’s partner countries beyond the borders of the European Union. This session had observers from countries that included Albania, Bosnia, Cameroun, Pakistan, Portugal and Tunisia, among others.

This week’s event – entitled “Work-life balance and inclusion: can skills help?” – showcased the findings of joint survey conducted by the ETF and Eurofound, a Dublin-based EU agency that focuses on gathering data on improving living and working conditions within the 27 EU member states.

The “Living, Working and COVID-19” survey looked at the impact of social, economic, health and other external conditions on the lives of men and women across the EU and 10 of the ETF’s external partner countries, including Albania, Georgia, Jordan, Kosovo, Lebanon, Moldova, Morocco, North Macedonia, Palestine and Tunisia. A follow up survey, that will include more ETF partner countries, will be launched in April 2023.

Daphne Nathalie Ahrendt, Senior Research Manager, Social Policies, at Eurofound, noted that before the impact of education and skills on inclusion and gender issues could be considered, there was a need to understand the nature of existing inequalities in the economy and society.

The main issues impacting people across the EU now in terms of well-being and inclusion were, she said, the “impact of COVID-19, the war in Ukraine, and the increased cost of living.” The mental health of many people – particularly young people and women – had suffered during the pandemic, but that is now also being affected by economic worries associated with rising costs of living and instability.

Outi Kärkkäinen, Senior Human Capital Development Expert - Focal point for Gender, at the ETF – who is currently on secondment to UNESCO in Paris, said that issues around social and gender inclusion and equality had existed before the pandemic, but had been exacerbated by the economic and social challenges of that time.

“The issues we face are now higher on the agenda,” she said. “The pandemic crisis made the situation worse. It reminded us that where structural inequalities exist, they tend to deteriorate further in a crisis.”

Many of the challenges people in the EU experienced during the pandemic – and since – exist in ETF partner countries, including pay disparities between men and women, and the relative amount of time they are engaged in formal and informal work.

The survey found that while men worked on average 42 hours per week, and women 37, when unpaid work (for example child care, housework, looking after elderly relatives) was included, women worked 100 hours per week, compared to 76 for men. “In the EU we found a 25% gender gap – often this was much wider in countries outside of the EU,” she noted.

Although some economic responses, including offering teleworking options to improve flexibility and help with work/life balance were possible, teleworking was only applicable to those with certain skills or educational attainment. A lack of regulation of homeworking meant that women in particular could find themselves “working longer hours, more overtime, and taking on more child care duties.”

Daphne cautioned that “while telework can be seen as a panacea, we have to be very careful.”

Teleworking had the potential to “improve work/life balance and give people more autonomy,” but there was a risk of doing longer hours, greater isolation, and an unfair distribution of such work between men and women.”

The EU parliament has been calling for legal limits on the hours spent teleworking, so that people can disconnect outside working hours, and under its Social Rights pillar was committed to improving work/life balance – for example by ensuring that new parents are eligible for four months parental leave, only two of which can be transferred to one partner.

Both contributors agreed that although over the years there had been much progress in inclusion and gender equality across the EU – and through policy support within EU neighbourhood and partner countries – there seemed to be a ceiling of old stereotypes. In Daphne’s home country, the Netherlands, for example, women still tended to take on part-time work, even when they were highly educated and well-qualified.

Outi noted that for too long there had been a focus on responding to gender issues, without engaging with transforming policies.

“A skilled woman cannot use her capabilities if there is no structure for childcare…or women-friendly public transport,” she said. “We need an education and training and skills development system that is not only gender responsive, but also gender transformative – that works on the root causes of the inequalities.”

Care was also needed when looking at gender issues in different countries not to transpose cultural ideas, she added.

“We need to understand that the informal economy is much more important in some countries. What does work/life balance mean when somebody has never had defined hours? Or someone who is working whenever they have the opportunity to sell something, or a mother takes her kids with her to the market?”

Although education and skills do have a positive role to play in improving inclusion and gender equality, birth control, child health and poverty reduction, is should only be seen as part of a holistic approach, she added.

“In the EU and neighbourhood, more women graduate from tertiary education than men, but activity rate is overall 15% lower women for women than men. In some countries the disparity is up to 40%. Education and skills help – but it is not enough to address gender inequality.”