Combining Lone Motherhood and Paid Work
The Rationality Mistake and Norwegian Social Policy
Bibliographic Data
| ID | 12256152 |
|---|---|
| Authors | Simon Duncan (Social Sciences and humanities, University of Bradford, Bradford BD7 1DP, UK, corresponding author), Monika Strell (National Housing Federation, Bristol, UK) |
| Year | 2004 |
| Volume | 14 |
| Issue | 1 |
| Pages | 41-54 |
| Publication date | 2004-02-01 |
| Peer Reviewed | Yes |
| Open Access | Yes |
| Type | ARTICLE |
| Venue | Journal of European Social Policy (JOURNAL) |
| Journal identifiers | ISSN: 0958-9287 • E-ISSN: 1461-7269 |
| Publisher | SAGE Publishing (PUBLISHER • US) |
| DOI | 10.1177/0958928704039789 |
| OpenAlex | W2003654304 |
| Language | EN |
| Citations received | 12 |
| References cited | 21 |
How lone mothers combine being mothers with employment has become a central policy issue in many western countries. But policy making is dominated by the operational assumption that lone mothers are ‘rational actors’ who make individual utility calculations about the costs and benefits of taking up paid work. This is what we have called the ‘rationality mistake’, for evidence shows that decisions are still made rationally, but with a different sort of rationality. In this article we use a case-study from Norway to explore this issue further. Norway is unusual in having a ‘designer benefit’ – the transitional allowance – exclusively for lone mothers. Before 1998, the transitional allowance positioned lone mothers as mothers at home, whereas after 1998 policy places lone mothers – after the first three years of motherhood – as workers in employment. The policy lever of benefit change was supposed to change how lone mothers – as rational economic actors – behave. Using an intensive research design, we find that lone mothers employ a moral and relational rationality which usually means that both the pre and post-1998 policy would act more as a constraint than an enabler on their behaviour
Allowance (engineering · Economics · Mistake · Norwegian · Political science · Positive economics · Rationality · Sociology · Work (physics · Employment and Welfare Studies · Law · Social Policy and Reform Studies · Work-Family Balance Challenges
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Working mothers’ gender ideologies on childcare and perception on existing childcare centres
Hardworking women
Work and Family
De)familialization and (De)genderization – Competing or Complementary Perspectives in Comparative Policy Analysis
From Defamilialization to Degenderization
Modes of Relational Agency among Welfare-reliant Mothers
Financial Consequences of Relationship Dissolution
Closing the Childcare Gap
Lone and Partnered Mothers' Childcare Time Within Context in Four Countries
Parental education, time in paid work and time with children
Analysing Families
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Same Sex Intimacies
Employment Strategy Policies and Lone Parenthood
Supporting families? New Labour's communitarianism and the 'rationality mistake
Careful or Lenient
A Market in Love? Choosing Pre‐school Childcare
Lone Mothers in European Welfare Regimes
Method in Social Science
On Sociology
Motherhood, Paid Work and Partnering
Women's Employment and Gender Attitudes
Dual Breadwinner Societies
Lone Mothers and 'Parental' Involvement
Grandparents Are the Next Best Thing
Mothers, Markets and the State
Moral Tales of the Child and the Adult
| Unique citing works | 12 |
|---|---|
| Citations per year | 0,6 |
| Citation span | 2006 - 2022 (17) |
| Citation velocity | historical |
| Highly cited | No |
| Citation types | Neutral: 12 |