The proportion of fathers receiving parental benefit is increasing. At the same time, it is still significantly lower than the proportion of mothers.
Parental benefit continues to be paid predominantly by mothers, but fathers are catching up. Last year, about 482,000 men claimed parental benefit. That was 2.1 percent higher than in 2021, as the Federal Statistical Office announced Wednesday in Wiesbaden. Thus, the proportion of fathers rose to 26.1 percent (2021: 25.3 percent).
Less parental assistance
However, it lagged significantly behind the proportion of mothers. Overall, the number of those receiving parental benefits fell 1.2 percent to 1.8 million.
The fathers ratio represents the ratio of male recipients of all parental benefit receipts. Therefore, if both the father and mother of all children received the parental benefit equally, it would be exactly 50 percent.
Major differences between federal states
As in the previous year, Saxony was the leader with a father rate of 30.2 percent, followed by Thuringia (28.4 percent), Bavaria (28.3 percent) and Baden-Württemberg (28.3 percent) in the comparison between the federal states. . As in the previous year, the lowest rate of fathers in 2022 was experienced in Saarland (20.8 percent).
According to the data, there are still significant differences between men and women in the planned duration of receiving parental benefit. As in the previous year, it was 14.6 months for women in 2022 (2020: 14.5 months; 2019: 14.3 months). On the other hand, the targeted qualifying time for men was significantly shorter and even slightly reduced compared to previous years, with an average of 3.6 months (2019 vs 2021: 3.7 months).
Parental benefit: what does this data mean?
Nina Stahr, spokesperson for Green Group’s education, research and technology assessment, said in a statement in Berlin that the data showed that “we are still a long way from gaining employment and care work being distributed equally in society”. There is a positive trend, with more and more fathers using maternity leave at 26.1 percent, “but we are still far from the equal distribution desire of many young families. The entitlement period also still differs significantly between women and men.”
Bettina Kohlrausch, scientific director of the Economic and Social Sciences Institute (WSI) at the union-affiliated Hans Böckler Foundation, said that while the slightly increase in the proportion of fathers is fundamentally pleasing, “the proportion of fathers receiving parental benefits receive benefits, but it is still alarmingly low.” .
Even the fact that the already much shorter reference period for fathers has declined somewhat compared to 2021 is particularly problematic.
Source: ZDF
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