5 Ways Fatherhood Brings Professional Success.

Men often enjoy higher wages than women for doing the same work but research shows that fathers make more than non-fathers and, no surprise, more than mothers.  Here are five reasons why dads are more successful.

1.       Research by Cornell found that employers favored fathers over non-fathers and over mothers in the hiring process.  Participants in the study considered fathers as more competent than mothers and childless men.  Additionally, study participants were more lenient with fathers late to work.

2.       Men with children earn six percent more while women earn four percent less for every child.

3.       While it may seem logical that men with multiple children are more focused on family and are potentially less productive at work than their peers without children, extensive research shows that fathers of at least two children are more productive than fathers of one child and men without any.

4.       Raising a family, according to studies, also prepares you for management.  “If You’ve Raised Kids, You Can Manage Anything,” author Ann Crittenden writes. “Anyone who has learned how to comfort a troublesome toddler, soothe the feelings of a sullen teenager, or manage the complex challenges of a fractious household can just as readily smooth the boss’s ruffled feathers, handle crises, juggle several urgent matters at once, motivate the team, and survive the most Byzantine office intrigues.”

5.       Fathers with children are more likely to accept promotions. 

To summarize, fathers are more desirable to employers, earn more money, they are at least as equally productive as their childless counterparts, they have received management training at home and are more willing to take on promotions and the accompanying added responsibilities.

Mothers on the other hand are significantly disadvantaged when compared to their childless counterparts.  While fathers typically make more money than men without children, the reverse is true for women.  Mothers make less money than non-mothers.  In fact according to research from 2001, the pay gap between mothers and non-mothers for women under 35 was larger than it was between women and men.  Today, mothers are paid only 73 cents for every dollar fathers are paid.  Also, as stated above, a mother’s salary decreases with each additional child while a man’s increases.  Furthermore, managers who were visibly pregnant were viewed as less committed to their jobs, less competent, more irrational and less authoritative.  

To summarize, mothers are less desirable to employers, more often viewed as incompetent and must work five extra months to be paid what working fathers are paid in one year.

Father’s day has just passed but for most working dads, every day is a father’s day!