Ending Hunger in America, 2014 Hunger Report Full Report | Page 78

Balancing Work and Family The Great Depression of the 1930s led to the New Deal, a set of economic initiatives that embodied a new social contract between the government and the public. As part of the New Deal, President Franklin D. Roosevelt and the Secretary of Labor, Francis Perkins, drafted the seminal Fair Labor Standards Act, which Congress passed in 1938. The law benefits families in many ways—particularly those in the lowest-paying jobs. The Fair Labor Standards Act set a federal minimum wage, established the 40-hour Figure 2.5 Mothers’ Labor Force Participation Rate, 1980-2010 workweek, and required employers to pay employees overtime for any 80% % 71 hours over 40 per week. In 1938, With children under 18 years old 40 hours was considered a short 70 workweek and the country was 61% With children under 3 years old still reeling from the effects of 57% 60 the Great Depression. Reducing unemployment was the president’s 59% top priority, and the new law made 50 42% With children under 1 year old it possible to put more people back to work.48 40 The Fair Labor Standards Act sets the “floor” for the fair treat34% 30 ment of workers and it remains a vital piece of legislation, but it 20 does not address the dual role of 1980 1983 1986 1989 1992 1995 1998 2001 2004 2007 2010 workers who are also caregivers. In the 1930s, most women with Source: Demos (2011), The State of Young America. Demos analysis of Current Population Survey data. children at home were not part of the paid workforce. President Roosevelt and Secretary Perkins, the first female Cabinet secretary, could not foresee the transformation of the American workplace as women entered the workforce in large numbers and more mothers added “breadwinner” to their responsibilities.49 This made the care of children and elders a much more complicated undertaking. This transformation is still under way: between 1980 and 2010, mothers in the workforce with children under age 18 increased by 14 percent; mothers with children under age 6 by 19 percent; and mothers with infants by 25 percent.50 See Figure 2.5. In survey after survey,51 parents, regardless of their income level, report that they are exhausted and under stress from managing work and family commitments. The Fair Labor Standards Act is silent on whether workers have a right to adapt their schedules to meet family needs. In the United States, workers who are allowed flexible scheduling and family leave tend to be those earning the most, while low-wage workers, arguably those most in need of these benefits, are the least likely to receive them.52 In the late 1990s, the U.K. government enacted a law that gives parents the right to request flexible schedules. Employers must provide this flexibility unless they can prove it will have an adverse 68? Chapter 2 n Bread for the World Institute