The family is a microsystem that plays an important role in children’s growth as independent members of society. The state can improve family environment and condition through family policy, as part of a major macrosystem that supports children’s ...
The family is a microsystem that plays an important role in children’s growth as independent members of society. The state can improve family environment and condition through family policy, as part of a major macrosystem that supports children’s development. This study aims to clarify the relationship between family policy and children's quality of life through an international comparison and to determine which combination of factors in family policy can explain children's quality of life.
The first research question is “Which family polices are related to children's quality of life in terms of health, economy, and time?”, and the second research question is “How can family policies be combined to improve children's quality of life in terms of health, economy, and time?” Family policy includes (1) child-related cash transfers to families with children, (2) family cash benefits for two-parent (dual-income) families, (3) public expenditures on services for families with children, (4) public spending on childcare and early education, (5) public expenditures on maternal and paternal leave, (6) average payment rate across paid leave for the mother, (7) full-rate equivalent weeks across paid leave for the mother, (8) average payment rate across paid leave for the father, and (9) full-rate equivalent weeks across paid leave for the father. Factors related to children's quality of life include (1) low birth weight, (2) infant mortality, (3) child poverty, (4) mother's time spent with children, and (5) father's time spent with children.
Using OECD Family Database, OECD Child Well-Being Data, and 2014 Time Use Survey, fuzzy-set qualitative comparison analysis(fsQCA) was used among 20 OECD countries. Since fsQCA assumes joint causal system that allows the interactions between each family policy indicator, it can verify the causal complexities of conjunctural causation.
As a result of the analysis, child poverty was found to be the only factor that served as a significant necessary condition of family policy. It indicates that countries with high rates of child poverty had 1) high family cash benefits for two-parent dual-income families and 2) high public expenditures on maternal and paternal leave, in common. The sufficient condition of family policy explaining the children's quality of life were as follows:
In terms of children's health, when the state actively provide support for the family services, maternity and parental leaves, and the average payment rate of paid leaves, it led to the country's low rate of low birth weight. In addition, if the full-rate equivalent weeks across paid leave for mother are short, the condition of high average payment rate across paid leave for father, state's active support for financial benefits, family service, and parent's leave are needed. On the other hand, if the full-rate equivalent weeks across paid leave for mother are short, and the support for child-related cash transfers and family cash benefits on a dual income family is low, both average payment rate across paid leave for mother and father should be high, and the active support for public expenditure on services for families with children, and public spending on childcare and early education is also necessary. Lastly, even when the support for father's average payment rate across paid leave and full-rate equivalent weeks across paid leave is low, when the child-related cash transfers to families with children is high, and the support for public expenditure on services for families with children, public spending on childcare and early education, and public expenditure on maternity and parental leaves are all active, the low birth weight rate resulted in low, regardless of the support for mother's leave. And for infant mortality, rather than supporting father's leave, active support for public expenditure on services for families with children, public spending on childcare and early education, public expenditure on maternity and parental leaves, and long full-rate equivalent weeks across paid leave for mother are needed.
In terms of children's economy, if state provides active support for mother's leave, the high public expenditure on maternity and parental leaves turned out to be important rather than the support for child-related cash transfers, and family cash benefits on a dual income family. Conversely, if the state provides active support for father's leave, the combination should include active support for child-related cash transfers, and family cash benefits on a dual income family. Moreover, even when both mother and father receive low support for their leaves, combining high family cash benefits for two-parent (dual-income) families, high average payment rate across paid leave for father, support for public expenditure on services for families with children, public spending on childcare and early education, and public expenditure on maternity and parental leaves can result in low child poverty.
In terms of children's time, significant combination was derived only from the amount of time spent with fathers. These results can demonstrate that family policies have more influence on the father's time with his children than on the mother's. However, it can rather also be translated that OECD countries’ currnet level of support for the family policy is not enough to increase the time spent with the mother. For the time spent with fathers, the combination of state's active support for father's long full-rate equivalent weeks across paid leave and all other family policy, including cash, service, and leave supports, leads to higher amount of time spent with fathers. Furthermore, when mothers have low average payment rate across paid leave and short full-rate equivalent weeks across paid leave, but fathers have high average payment rate across paid leave, with the active support for public expenditure on services for families, public spending on childcare and early education, and public expenditure on maternity and parental leaves, it result in longer time children spend with their fathers.
This study contributes to the literature as following. First, this study revealed the relationship between family policy and the children's quality of life, which supports the effectiveness of state's investment in family policy. In addition, it is meaningful that it provided child-centered implications for family policy. Furthermore, by using the fuzzy-set qualitative comparison analysis, this study emphasized the configurational approach, showing how each family policy can combine and improve the quality of children's lives. This is to say, this study revealed that it is not a single policy that improves the children's quality of life, but various combinations of policy since family policies interact with each other.