Return-to-Office Is Pushing Women Out of Work
About this episode
This episode discusses the impact of return-to-office mandates on women's employment and the complexities of work-life balance.
When employers demand that people return to the office full-time, who pays the biggest price? In this episode of MissPerceived , Professor Leah Ruppanner responds to a listener whose partner is being called back into the office — and whose family is already feeling the consequences. Leah explores what the research says about remote and flexible work, why it became essential for so many mothers’ employment during the pandemic, and why return-to-office mandates risk pushing women out of the workforce again. But flexibility is not a simple fix. Leah unpacks the flexibility paradox : working from home can help women stay employed and manage caregiving, but it can also stretch the workday into early mornings, late nights, and an exhausting always-on cycle of paid work, parenting, housework, and guilt. She also explains the unequal career trade-offs families make. Too often, women make career compromises “for the family,” while men are encouraged to accelerate their careers as breadwinners — even when both parents genuinely want more time with their children. The result is a gendered mental load, unequal long-term earnings, and a system that asks mothers to hold work and family…
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