Serena Williams’ retirement and the ugly reality for working moms

This blog post was written by our marketing intern, Celeste. She talks about the recent retirement announcement made by Serena Williams and how it relates to a wider problem in our society: the motherhood penalty.

Earlier this month, Serena Williams announced her retirement. In the Vogue article, she expressed feeling forced to choose between her family and her career. This decision seems shocking for someone who was ranked 1st in the world by the Women’s Tennis Association - and yet this reasoning seems to be the same for many other mothers or expecting parents around the world who have had to face the same decision. As Serena puts it in her own words: If I were a guy, I wouldn’t be writing this because I’d be out there playing and winning while my wife was doing the physical labor of expanding our family. Another way to describe what happened would be the use of the term ‘motherhood penalty’.

But what is the motherhood penalty?

The motherhood penalty is something very real and very present in our society today. A term coined by sociologists, it is used to describe the disadvantages women with children have to face in the workplace. The most prominent disadvantage is the gender pay gap; the motherhood penalty accounts for up to 80% of it. Some researchers such as Henrik Kleven go as far as saying that the gender pay gap should be described as the motherhood penalty, after research found that women with kids had a wage gap twice as large as women without. Economist Claudia Goldin further proves this by making it clear that the gender wage gap is the biggest for women in their 30s, the same time many have children.

Economic Effects

Since the motherhood penalty makes up a large portion of the gender pay gap, it is closely tied with economic consequences. Women make 83 cents to every dollar men earn. Overall, a study in 2009 by the University of Chicago’s Marianna Bertrand examined business school graduates and found that nine years into their careers, men were earning 60% more than women. Unsurprisingly, intersectionality plays a big factor in the gender pay gap. The motherhood penalty is higher for women of color, and the gender pay gap leads to losses of billions of dollars for women of color, especially black women and hispanic women. 

The gender employment gap and pay gap affects the wider economy just as much as the mothers; closing the gender pay gap would lead to the U.S economy growing by around 3% to 4%, with a potential $482 billion added. Not only would this help the national economy - this growth could massively help working women in poverty.

The retirement gap is equally very much a reality; the average retirement gap comes to around 34% in the U.S, meaning men contribute to retirement funds much more often than women due to the consistency of their employment.

In addition, with the overturn of Roe v Wade, the motherhood penalty is bound to affect more people; women won’t have the same agency to decide whether or not they are ready to have children. Once they do have children, finding child care is extremely difficult and the cost and lack of supply often impact mothers and their work.

Social effects

The motherhood penalty is evidently linked to economic setbacks, but it equally has multiple social effects. These social setbacks are already seen even before mothers start working; after a study conducted by Corell, Benard, and Paik, women with children are 79% less likely to be hired than women without children. On average, women with children were offered less money. These findings were seen yet again in another study, proving that women with children are less likely to be hired.

Employers and the workplace can also hold biases towards women with children once they start to work. Many workplaces and jobs are not flexible towards working mothers and do not give them the same opportunities or conditions as fathers or women without children. Mothers can be put in danger or denied certain rights. Even personal experiences from mothers such as Serena Williams, who had to quit her job, are very similar to other women who quit their job for similar reasons. These social prejudices affect not only the mother but also the children;  working mothers who had support from their work during the first few years of their child led to better parental well being and to better social skills in children.

Is it all bad?

Although millions of women including Serena Williams have had to stop their job to care for their children, there have been improvements in the last few years surrounding the gender pay gap and the motherhood penalty. The gender pay gap is shown to have continued closing (albeit slowly) even with the pandemic, and is expected to be closed by 2029. Covid also forced all parents to start working at home; this meant that housework started to be shared more equally between both parents. But the problem is far from over.

The motherhood penalty doesn’t just affect women, or mothers, or expecting parents; it affects everyone in the workplace, in our economy, and in our society. These setbacks prove that it is not only another ‘woman's issue’, but rather a wider issue that should concern everyone. Different groups can make a big change by just making small little steps in the right direction to promote equality in the workplace between genders but more importantly equality for mothers, who have been shunned upon in the workplace for a long time.

What can we do to change it?

As individuals, we can vote to make policy changes in our state and our country. For women who suffer from discrimination, you can speak to your employer or seek legal help; discrimination in the workplace is more and more recognized and your employer could be fined. For men, who are also affected by this penalty, you can be allies and support the changes that should be made.

Employers should offer more family-friendly work policies, such as more flexible working, childcare subsidies, and paid leave.

For the bigger picture, the government needs to offer more affordable childcare, and enact a federal paid leave policy. By working together at every level, we are capable of producing change and building a more equitable future.