Budgets and legislation with a gender perspective: Early childhood education, parental leave, working hours and working conditions

Abstract

Budgets and legislation with a gender perspective: Early childhood education, parental leave, working hours and working conditions Education for 0 to 3-year-olds is a policy area with very significant effects on child wellbeing and gender equality. Universal access to childhood education is a key factor in guaranteeing equal opportunities; when it is of high quality, it has positive effects in the short, medium and long term for all children, especially those from vulnerable backgrounds. Likewise, the level of childcare availability is a determining factor in women’s participation in the employment market. This paper aims to estimate the costs and benefits of universalising the first cycle of early childhood education in Spain; it looks at the current situation, at possible improvements in quality and working conditions, and its relationship with achievable reforms of basic policies for feminist economics: successive parental leave and shorter working weeks. For the ex ante evaluation, a cost-benefit analysis is undertaken, using up-to-date costs and benefits from 2021, and taking into consideration cost variations in various possible scenarios in Spain, as well as potential funding sources. The benefits easily outweigh the costs not only of the universalisation of early childhood education for 0 to 3-year-olds, but also of a significant improvement in its quality and in working conditions. If the parental leave system is modified to guarantee the option of taking parental leave successively and extending home childcare to eight months, the increase in quality can be afforded. Reforming parental leave would also cover the cost of significantly improving working conditions in this largely female-dominated sector.