AGI – 96 thousand mothers lost their jobs in Italy during the pandemic. An army of women of which 4 out of 5 have children under the age of 5. The 6th Report notes this “Le Equilibriste: motherhood in Italy 2021”, released by Save the Children – the Organization that for over 100 years has been fighting to save children at risk and guarantee them a future – on mothers in Italy, on the occasion of Mother’s Day.
There are just over 6 million women with minor children in Italy and in the year of the pandemic many of them were significantly penalized due to the domestic work and care they had to bear during the periods of closure of services for the childhood and schools.
The report, in addition to underlining the difficulties faced by mothers in such a difficult year, such as 2020, once again brings out the gap between the North and South of the country. In detail, out of 249,000 women who lost their jobs in 2020, 96,000 are mothers with minor children. Among them, 4 out of 5 have children under the age of five: they are those mothers who, due to the need to follow younger children, have had to give up work or have been expelled. On the other hand, underlines the association, almost all – 90,000 out of 96,000 – were already employed part-time before the pandemic.
According to the data, in the in 2019 alone, the resignations or consensual terminations of the employment relationship of working fathers and working mothers involved 51,558 people, but over 7 out of 10 measures (37,611, 72.9%) concerned working mothers and in most cases the motivation behind this choice was precisely the difficulty in reconciling work with the needs of children: absence of supportive relatives, high incidence of care costs for the newborn (nursery or babysitter), non-acceptance at the nursery, the most recurrent justifications.
An obstacle course on the horizon of women who choose to become mothers, who also hold the record of the oldest in Europe at the birth of their first child (32.2 years against an average of mothers in the EU of 29.4).
And above all they are having fewer and fewer children: births have registered a further decline, minus 16 thousand in 2020 (-3.8% compared to the previous year). An exception is that of the Autonomous Province of Bolzano, in the lead by birth rate (9.6 births per thousand inhabitants), while Sardinia records the lowest rate (5.1 births per thousand inhabitants).
According to Istat, especially in the last months of the year (November and December), the negative variation in births was particularly accentuated compared to 2019: in November, in fact, the decline was -8.2% and in that in December it even touches – 10.3%.
“Covid has put all of us in front of a health emergency first of all, but which soon turned out to be also a social, economic and educational crisis. Mothers in Italy have paid and continue to pay a very high tribute to these. emergencies “, commented Antonella Winter, Head of Childhood Policies at Save the Children. “It is now important – he added – to direct efforts towards the concrete realization of objectives that aim not only at encouraging the participation of women in the labor market, but at liberating them from the front of unpaid work”.
But even before the pandemic, the association underlines, many women were left out of the job market due to the impossibility of combining work and family life and personal fulfillment. “The measures to create a more favorable environment for mothers can be many and involve different sectors of public intervention, on various levels of government – explains the Organization in its report – but they must follow an organic policy to be really effective.
To date, however, if the gender gap in employment rates is already high in the general population, among parents of minor children it records too high levels: in 2020, it increased by half a point, reaching 30.7 percentage points of difference, with 87.8% employed fathers and 57.1% employed mothers. Furthermore, not only do mothers tend to be much less present in the world of work than fathers, but their presence, unlike that of fathers, tends to decrease as the number of children increases “.
The Report “The Equilibrists: maternity in Italy 2021” by Save the Children, includes, as every year, the Index of Mothers which identifies the Regions that commit themselves, more or less, to support motherhood in Italy. Also this year, it is the Northern regions that are more mother friendly: here data are recorded well above the national average, compared to those of the South, where all three indicators included in the areas of care, work and services, are positioned at the below that average.
In the general index, the most virtuous regions are again the Autonomous Provinces of Bolzano and Trento followed by Valle d’Aosta (in 4th place last year) and Emilia-Romagna (which loses one position compared to 2020). Bottom line is Campania (in 2020 it was second to last), Calabria (in 19th place last year) and Sicily (which lost the last position), preceded by Basilicata (in 17th place in 2020). For the regions of the South the composite index always shows values below 93, even if the trend seems to be slightly improving.
Also in the area of care, the first two places are occupied by the Autonomous Provinces of Bolzano and Trento (fourth in 2020) while the third position is in Lombardy (which loses one position compared to last year), followed by Emilia-Romagna (in 3rd place in 2020) and Piedmont (in the same position in 2020).
Emblematic is the case of the Aosta Valley which, although gaining two positions compared to last year, is in 9th place, far from the third of the general index. The last positions in the Cura area are occupied by Basilicata (which loses two places) and Sardinia (which confirms the 20th position) preceded by Puglia, which loses the unwelcome last place, and Abruzzo (which confirms the 18th place).
However, there is a general improvement to underline, due to a greater propensity for an equal distribution of family care and work loads within couples, even if not yet sufficient to reduce the imbalances still existing in the division of family commitment. between women and men. Comparing the 2020 values with those of 2004, there is an improvement in all regions.
The coveted work shows the situation of the most virtuous regions unchanged compared to 2020, with in the first places the Autonomous Province of Bolzano, the Valle d’Aosta and the Autonomous Province of Trento followed by Emilia-Romagna and Lombardy, these too in the same positions as last year. Sicily, Campania and Calabria also occupy the 2nd, 20th and 19th place respectively, exactly as in 2020. The data shows an improvement in the situation from 2004 to 2008, when a slow decline is recorded.
Furthermore, all the regions of the South (with the exception of Abruzzo in 2008), for the seven years of comparison, show values well below the reference 100. Finally, the services area, where the same regions of 2020 are confirmed in the top positions. In first place the Autonomous Province of Trento followed by Valle d’Aosta and Friuli-Venezia Giulia.
Tuscany occupies 4th place (5th last year), while the Autonomous Province of Bolzano loses one position and stands at 5th. The data show the constant growth of the Autonomous Provinces of Trento and Bolzano which, together with Valle d’Aosta, Friuli-Venezia Giulia, Tuscany and Umbria are the only ones, in 2020, to present values above the reference value of 2004.
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