• Home
  • Latest
  • Fortune 500
  • Finance
  • Tech
  • Leadership
  • Lifestyle
  • Rankings
  • Multimedia

Trendingnow

1

Philanthropy leader at Warren Buffett and Bill Gates’ Giving Pledge says children of billionaires are pushing them to give their wealth away faster

2

MacKenzie Scott alone accounted for one-third of America's $19.2 billion in megagifts last year

3

The 33-year-old executive Satya Nadella is trusting to fix Microsoft’s Copilot AI assistant

1

Philanthropy leader at Warren Buffett and Bill Gates’ Giving Pledge says children of billionaires are pushing them to give their wealth away faster

2

MacKenzie Scott alone accounted for one-third of America's $19.2 billion in megagifts last year

3

The 33-year-old executive Satya Nadella is trusting to fix Microsoft’s Copilot AI assistant
NewslettersBroadsheet

Pandemic lockdowns pose a new risk to working moms: the kid-interruption gap

By
Claire Zillman
Claire Zillman
and
Emma Hinchliffe
Emma Hinchliffe
Down Arrow Button Icon
By
Claire Zillman
Claire Zillman
and
Emma Hinchliffe
Emma Hinchliffe
Down Arrow Button Icon
May 28, 2020, 8:39 AM ET
Aerial View Of Mother Working In Office At Home With Daughter
An aerial view of a mother working on a laptop in her office at hoe with her young daughter string on her lap.Getty Images
Add Fortune on Google for similar content.

Good morning, Broadsheet readers! AMD’s Lisa Su tops a new list of highest-paid CEOs, Cecile Richards talks to Fortune about making sure women can vote safely in November, and we explore more data about mothers in the pandemic. Enjoy your Thursday.

– Risks of the kid-interruption gap. A new survey in the U.K. puts in stark relief the toll the pandemic is taking on mothers: Women with kids are 47% more likely than men with children to have permanently lost or quit their jobs since February. They are 14% more likely to have been furloughed.

All told, “mothers in two-parent households are only doing, on average, a third of the uninterrupted paid-work hours of fathers. Before lockdown, mothers did around 60% of the uninterrupted work hours of fathers,” according to the study of 3,500 families with two opposite-sex parents by Institute for Fiscal Studies and the UCL Institute of Education.

The burden on mothers extends beyond job losses and reduced hours. Mothers are shouldering the bulk of the time commitment of new duties related to childcare and housework. They’re dedicating 10.3 hours every day to looking after the kids—2.3 hours more than fathers. Dads are spending more time on such activities generally—double the hours they spent on childcare in 2014-2015, in fact—yet men matched women’s household output only in families where the mother had kept her job and the father had lost his.

The study also points to nuances of parents’ new at-home existence that are easily overlooked. It reveals, for instance, a sort of child-interruption gap: Moms are far more likely than dads to be interrupted during their paid working hours. Nearly half—47%—of mothers’ working hours are split between professional duties and other activities like childcare. That figure is 30% for fathers.

Those kid cameos on Zoom are cute, but the study warns that moms’ multitasking is a risk when “focused work time is important for performance.” The mom-dad imbalance on this front could “further [increase] the gender wage gap among parents.”

These statistics may not come as a surprise to parents currently homeschooling while working—or in worse cases, homeschooling while looking for a job—but they underscore how vital childcare is as nations emerge from shutdowns and economies look to recover. There will be no “normal” without reopened daycare centers and schools.

Claire Zillman
claire.zillman@fortune.com
@clairezillman

Today’s Broadsheet was curated by Emma Hinchliffe. 

ALSO IN THE HEADLINES

- Big bucks. For the first time since the AP began its executive pay survey nine years ago, a female chief executive tops the nationwide ranking: Advanced Micro Devices CEO Lisa Su earned $58.5 million in 2019. Fortune

- Tennis match. And speaking of pay, the world of sports has a new top earner too. Tennis star Naomi Osaka passed Serena Williams as the highest-earning female athlete. Since June 2019, Osaka took in $37.4 million to Williams's $36 million. Forbes

- Get out the vote. Cecile Richards, co-founder of Supermajority and former president of Planned Parenthood, is working to make sure women can vote safely in November. She talked to Fortune about the challenges facing women at the ballot box, including women's greater concern, compared to men's, about safety during the coronavirus pandemic: Fortune

- Historic run. Jennifer Carroll Foy is fighting to become the first black female governor in the U.S. (the 'first' that Stacey Abrams came close to achieving). The Virginia state delegate announced her campaign yesterday. She's the first black woman to run for statewide office in Virginia, and her resume includes pushing the state to ratify the Equal Rights Amendment earlier this year. Elle

MOVERS AND SHAKERS: New York Public Radio hired Chilewich chief digital officer Ayesha Ahmad as CMO. 

IN CASE YOU MISSED IT

- Huawei gets a no. Chinese tech giant Huawei lost its fight yesterday to end extradition proceedings for CFO Meng Wanzhou. Meng will remain under house arrest in Canada, instead of returning to China as the company and country had fought for. Bloomberg

- Entertainment action. Actress Gabrielle Union in a Variety cover story gave her first in-depth interview about her firing from America's Got Talent. "My goal is real change—and not just on this show but for the larger parent company," Union says about her efforts to improve the NBC show's workplace. In related news: Time's Up released a guide for how businesses can lead with equity and inclusion in mind during a crisis. 

- Keeping it original. Yesterday's launch of HBO Max was shepherded by Sarah Aubrey, head of original programming for the new streaming service. She is counting on experienced filmmakers to be the first to resume production as the entertainment industry emerges from its shutdown: "You need your 10,000 hours to manage this kind of situation," she says. New York Times

ON MY RADAR

Amid the pandemic, is Hong Kong facing a different kind of death? The New Yorker

How women really feel about voting for Joe Biden InStyle

I was seven months pregnant in prison. Then COVID-19 hit The Cut

PARTING WORDS

"He thought it might get a laugh. It didn’t."

-Michigan Gov. Gretchen Whitmer on her husband's "failed attempt at humor," asking if he could get their boat moved into the water sooner because he was married to the governor

About the Authors
Claire Zillman
By Claire ZillmanEditor, Leadership
LinkedIn iconTwitter icon

Claire Zillman is a senior editor at Fortune, overseeing leadership stories. 

See full bioRight Arrow Button Icon
Emma Hinchliffe
By Emma HinchliffeMost Powerful Women Editor
LinkedIn iconTwitter icon

Emma Hinchliffe is Fortune’s Most Powerful Women editor, overseeing editorial for the longstanding franchise. As a senior writer at Fortune, Emma has covered women in business and gender-lens news across business, politics, and culture. She is the lead author of the Most Powerful Women Daily newsletter (formerly the Broadsheet), Fortune’s daily missive for and about the women leading the business world.

See full bioRight Arrow Button Icon
Add Fortune on Google for similar content.

Latest in Newsletters

Finance
Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, consectetur adipiscing elit, sed do eiusmod tempor incididunt ut labore et dolore magna aliqua. Ut enim ad minim veniam
By Fortune Editors
October 20, 2025
Finance
Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, consectetur adipiscing elit, sed do eiusmod tempor incididunt ut labore et dolore magna aliqua. Ut enim ad minim veniam
By Fortune Editors
October 20, 2025
Finance
Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, consectetur adipiscing elit, sed do eiusmod tempor incididunt ut labore et dolore magna aliqua. Ut enim ad minim veniam
By Fortune Editors
October 20, 2025
Finance
Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, consectetur adipiscing elit, sed do eiusmod tempor incididunt ut labore et dolore magna aliqua. Ut enim ad minim veniam
By Fortune Editors
October 20, 2025
Finance
Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, consectetur adipiscing elit, sed do eiusmod tempor incididunt ut labore et dolore magna aliqua. Ut enim ad minim veniam
By Fortune Editors
October 20, 2025
Finance
Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, consectetur adipiscing elit, sed do eiusmod tempor incididunt ut labore et dolore magna aliqua. Ut enim ad minim veniam
By Fortune Editors
October 20, 2025

Most Popular

Finance
Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, consectetur adipiscing elit, sed do eiusmod tempor incididunt ut labore et dolore magna aliqua. Ut enim ad minim veniam
By Fortune Editors
October 20, 2025
Finance
Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, consectetur adipiscing elit, sed do eiusmod tempor incididunt ut labore et dolore magna aliqua. Ut enim ad minim veniam
By Fortune Editors
October 20, 2025
Finance
Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, consectetur adipiscing elit, sed do eiusmod tempor incididunt ut labore et dolore magna aliqua. Ut enim ad minim veniam
By Fortune Editors
October 20, 2025
Finance
Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, consectetur adipiscing elit, sed do eiusmod tempor incididunt ut labore et dolore magna aliqua. Ut enim ad minim veniam
By Fortune Editors
October 20, 2025
Finance
Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, consectetur adipiscing elit, sed do eiusmod tempor incididunt ut labore et dolore magna aliqua. Ut enim ad minim veniam
By Fortune Editors
October 20, 2025
Finance
Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, consectetur adipiscing elit, sed do eiusmod tempor incididunt ut labore et dolore magna aliqua. Ut enim ad minim veniam
By Fortune Editors
October 20, 2025
Fortune Secondary Logo
Rankings
  • 100 Best Companies
  • Fortune 500
  • Global 500
  • Fortune 500 Europe
  • Most Powerful Women
  • World's Most Admired Companies
  • See All Rankings
  • Lists Calendar
Sections
  • Finance
  • Fortune Crypto
  • Features
  • Leadership
  • Health
  • Commentary
  • Success
  • Retail
  • Mpw
  • Tech
  • Lifestyle
  • CEO Initiative
  • Asia
  • Politics
  • Conferences
  • Europe
  • Newsletters
  • Personal Finance
  • Environment
  • Magazine
  • Education
Customer Support
  • Frequently Asked Questions
  • Customer Service Portal
  • Privacy Policy
  • Terms Of Use
  • Single Issues For Purchase
  • International Print
Commercial Services
  • Advertising
  • Fortune Brand Studio
  • Fortune Analytics
  • Fortune Conferences
  • Business Development
  • Group Subscriptions
About Us
  • About Us
  • Press Center
  • Work At Fortune
  • Terms And Conditions
  • Site Map
  • About Us
  • Press Center
  • Work At Fortune
  • Terms And Conditions
  • Site Map
  • Facebook icon
  • Twitter icon
  • LinkedIn icon
  • Instagram icon
  • Pinterest icon

Latest in Newsletters

What Marianne Lake’s exit from the race to succeed Jamie Dimon at JPMorgan tells us about women’s leadership
NewslettersMPW Daily
What Marianne Lake’s exit from the race to succeed Jamie Dimon at JPMorgan tells us about women’s leadership
By Emma HinchliffeJune 26, 2026
2 days ago
Exclusive: Framework Ventures raises $400 million for fourth fund as firm expands beyond crypto
NewslettersTerm Sheet
Exclusive: Framework Ventures raises $400 million for fourth fund as firm expands beyond crypto
By Ben WeissJune 26, 2026
2 days ago
MacBook Neo laptop computers during an Apple event in New York on Wednesday, March 4, 2026. (Photo: Adam Gray/Bloomberg/Getty Images)
NewslettersFortune Tech
Apple loses its iron grip on pricing power
By Andrew NuscaJune 26, 2026
2 days ago
Two former governors launch a bipartisan coalition to confront the coming AI jobs shock
NewslettersCEO Daily
Two former governors launch a bipartisan coalition to confront the coming AI jobs shock
By Diane BradyJune 26, 2026
2 days ago
Exclusive: Hera raises $27 million to tackle the unpaid caregiving that falls on daughters of the sandwich generation
NewslettersMPW Daily
Exclusive: Hera raises $27 million to tackle the unpaid caregiving that falls on daughters of the sandwich generation
By Emma HinchliffeJune 25, 2026
3 days ago
VivaTech entrance in Paris.
NewslettersEye on AI
Europe’s AI wake-up call: Cybersecurity threats, sovereignty fears, and a growing demand for ROI dominated VivaTech
By Beatrice NolanJune 25, 2026
3 days ago

Most Popular

Philanthropy leader at Warren Buffett and Bill Gates’ Giving Pledge says children of billionaires are pushing them to give their wealth away faster
Success
Philanthropy leader at Warren Buffett and Bill Gates’ Giving Pledge says children of billionaires are pushing them to give their wealth away faster
By Preston ForeJune 27, 2026
1 day ago
MacKenzie Scott alone accounted for one-third of America's $19.2 billion in megagifts last year
Success
MacKenzie Scott alone accounted for one-third of America's $19.2 billion in megagifts last year
By Sydney LakeJune 25, 2026
3 days ago
The 33-year-old executive Satya Nadella is trusting to fix Microsoft’s Copilot AI assistant
AI
The 33-year-old executive Satya Nadella is trusting to fix Microsoft’s Copilot AI assistant
By Sebastian HerreraJune 27, 2026
1 day ago
Now worth $200 million, Sarah Jessica Parker credits being ‘one of eight kids that struggled financially’ for her hunger, ambition, and work ethic
Success
Now worth $200 million, Sarah Jessica Parker credits being ‘one of eight kids that struggled financially’ for her hunger, ambition, and work ethic
By Orianna Rosa RoyleJune 24, 2026
4 days ago
The end of Putin’s regime will spring from war spending chaos, former central bank advisor says, amid military mutiny threat and fuel-shortage brawls
Europe
The end of Putin’s regime will spring from war spending chaos, former central bank advisor says, amid military mutiny threat and fuel-shortage brawls
By Jason MaJune 27, 2026
17 hours ago
Forget the ceasefire — The U.S. and Iran are still locked in combat over the Strait of Hormuz as Tehran tries to shut down a competing route
Middle East
Forget the ceasefire — The U.S. and Iran are still locked in combat over the Strait of Hormuz as Tehran tries to shut down a competing route
By Jason MaJune 27, 2026
13 hours ago

© 2026 Fortune Media IP Limited. All Rights Reserved. Use of this site constitutes acceptance of our Terms of Use and Privacy Policy | CA Notice at Collection and Privacy Notice | Do Not Sell/Share My Personal Information
FORTUNE is a trademark of Fortune Media IP Limited, registered in the U.S. and other countries. FORTUNE may receive compensation for some links to products and services on this website. Offers may be subject to change without notice.