Take-up of leave a. Maternity Leave

Almost all mothers use the leave.

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b. Paternity leave

Approximately two thirds of fathers take paternity leave and this rate has been rather constant since 1992. In 2003, 44,500 men received paternity allowance and the average length of the leave taken was 14 work days.

But only 2,105 fathers, i.e less than 4% of all fathers, took the newly in-troduced bonus leave period (i.e. they had taken the last two weeks of the preceding parental leave).

Paternity leave is taken more often by men (a) with middle-level income who work in white collar and skilled jobs in social and health care and education as well as in technical branches and manufacturing industry;

and (b) who are spouses of young, well-educated women in white collar or skilled jobs. Men who are less likely to take paternity leave include those: in management or other senior posi-tions; in agriculture or con-struction work; on low incomes; or with a spouse over 40 years of age or less educated or with a blue-collar job or on a low income. Length of pa-ternity leave correlates with the father's age and sector of employment as well as industry: men in their thirties take longer paternity leave than men in their twenties or forties, and men who work in the private sector take shorter leaves than men in the public sector. The full three weeks of paternity leave is most often taken by men who work in the social and health care sector or in agri-culture; it is least often taken in education and art sectors as well as in construction (Lammi-Taskula, 2003).

c. Parental leave

The 158 days of parental leave is mostly taken by mothers. Almost all mothers take parental leave whereas only 2-3% of fathers have taken lea-ve olea-ver the years it has been available. Howelea-ver, the new arrangement under which there are bonus days of paternity leave to fathers who take the last two weeks of parental leave has doubled the number of men ta-king parental leave: in 2002, only 1700 men re-ceived parental allowan-ce, while in 2003 the number was almost 3700. But at the same time the average length of the leave taken by fathers diminished from 64 to 37 workdays.

Parental leave is taken more often by men with a good employment posi-tion and a high level of educaposi-tion. Take-up is also more common among men over 30 years of age, and working in the public sector in scientific work or social and health care. Two fifths of fathers taking leave use a month or less, while a fifth use at least five months. Unlike paternity lea-ve, the length of parental leave taken by men is connected to their level of education and socio-economic position. Men with a high level of

edu-cation, in skilled jobs or in superior positions took shorter periods of lea-ve than men with a lower lelea-vel of education and in blue-collar or less skilled white-collar position. The position of the men's spouses also play-ed a role: longer parental leave was more rarely taken by men with a spouse in a blue-collar job; while fathers’ take-up of parental leave is most common in families where the mother has university education and/or high income (Lammi-Taskula, 2003).

In 2003, the first year that the part-time option for taking parental leave was avail-able, 37 parents received the partial parental allowance, rising to 84 in 2004. This means that less than 50 families, 0.1% per cent of fa-milies with a new-born child, have used the new arrangement in its first two years.

d. Home care leave

Mothers usually stay at home longer than the parental leave. Only a quar-ter of mothers giving birth in 1999 returned to employment right afquar-ter pa-rental leave: on average mothers stayed at home until their child was 18 months old. Just over half (53 %) of mothers were at home taking care of their child at two years after the birth, but a third of these women were already on maternity or parental leave with the next baby. Part of the women staying at home were officially unemployed or combined home care of children with studying or part-time work. (Lammi-Taskula, 2004).

The results of recent research confirm earlier findings that the leave schemes seem to create two categories of women: women with higher le-vels of education and better employment prospects have more options, being able to choose between a shorter or a longer family leave period, maybe also between a period of part-time work and working full time;

women with little education and less chances in the labour market have fewer alternatives. So, a woman without work prior to the birth of her child is more likely to stay at home for a longer period supported by the home care allowance. The home care allowance, therefore, seems to have be-come an income source for unemployed women; rather than functio-ning as an al-ternative to use of childcare services, as intended, it also serves as an alternative to unemployment (Lammi-Taskula 2004).

This leave is used almost entirely by women. There are no yearly publis-hed statis-tics on the take-up of home care leave but the share of fathers who take the leave is assessed to be 2-3 % (Lammi-Taskula, 2003).

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Only a small number if families – between 1200 and 2100 a year – take advantage of partial care leave.

e. Other employment-related measures

There is no information available of the take-up of temporary care leave.

5. Recently completed and current research on leave and other em-ployment-related policies

a. General overview

Research on statutory leave entitlements and on take-up is done on the initiative of individual researchers; no systematic follow-up takes place except for basic statis-tics. Research has been focused on the take-up of parental and homecare leave and its connections with women's labour market participation as well as on men's take-up of family leaves. Recent research has compared the schemes as well as the take-up and its conse-quences in the Nordic countries and also widened the focus to workplace attitudes and practices in connection with leave take-up. In addition, de-cision-making between the parents and men's and women's reasons for leave taking has been studied, as well as the consequences of leave-taking to the eco-nomic position of families. Follow-up studies of the ta-ke-up of new forms of pa-ternity and parental leave are under way.

b. Some recent research studies

1. Family Leaves from the Perspectives of Gender equality (2001-2003):

Minna Salmi and Johanna Lammi-Taskula, STAKES. This survey of mo-thers and famo-thers having children in 1999 focuses on parents’ practices, wishes and opinions on how to take care of young children as well as their workplace experiences when taking leave and returning from leave.

Questionnaire data was collected in 2001/2002 from 3295 mothers and 1413 fathers. Contact firstname.lastname@stakes.fi

6. Selected publications on leave and leave-related policies (2000