Maternal Job Loss Can Affect Child Development

A job loss has considerable negative consequences for those hit by unemployment. This is all the more relevant if families are affected. It not only relates to a family's financial situation: a mother losing her job can also impact on child development. A study conducted by DIW Berlin using data from the German Socio-Economic Panel Study (SOEP) shows that this is indeed the case as far as non-cognitive skills such as social behavior are concerned: pre-school children whose mothers have involuntarily lost their job have more socio-emotional problems than children whose mothers have not faced this situation. The same applies to adolescents: if their mother becomes unemployed, young people have less confidence in their ability to determine the course of their own lives.