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How is this a surprise to anyone? Children require time and effort, and this usually means one of the parents works less or not at all. Considering 25 to 35 are

How is this a surprise to anyone? Children require time and effort, and this usually means one of the parents works less or not at all. Considering 25 to 35 are prime child-rearing ages, the reason for this gap seems quite obvious.

IAmEveryone 8y ago
The result indicates that 25 to 35 is prime career age, not prime child-rearing age (the latter may well be true, but this study doesn't answer that question). It's somewhat surprising that younger ages, especially 18 to 25, do not have this effect. I would have probably guessed that any hiatus in your professional career (including education) would result in a proportionally-delayed career advance throughout your career. I. e.: spend 2 years with children from 23-25 and your income at 60 is what you'd have made at 58 without children.
- lotsofpulp 8y ago
  The article is comparing pay gap between married partners. Those who have children when they are younger are much less likely to be highly educated or be in high paying careers to begin with, and they're not likely to be in a relationship with someone who is either. Lower pay in general implies lower variance since they're not likely to be moving up the ranks into $100k, $150k, $200k+ careers.
- tomp 8y ago
  > It's somewhat surprising that younger ages, especially 18 to 25, do not have this effect Not really. My hunch is that it's due to two reasons: (1) education is often much less intensive than a competitive career, so it's much earier to study while having a child (in many cases, you don't even need to attend the lectures, just pass the exams!); (2) probably the much bigger reason is that the "have children before 25" sample includes mostly people in non-professional careers where there isn't a lot of room for advancement anyways... someone with 2 years of experience as a store clerk or receptionist is worth about the same as someone with 4 years of experience, whereas the worth is significantly different in something like medicine, investment banking, programming, ...

IAmEveryone 8y ago

The result indicates that 25 to 35 is prime career age, not prime child-rearing age (the latter may well be true, but this study doesn't answer that question). It's somewhat surprising that younger ages, especially 18 to 25, do not have this effect. I would have probably guessed that any hiatus in your professional career (including education) would result in a proportionally-delayed career advance throughout your career. I. e.: spend 2 years with children from 23-25 and your income at 60 is what you'd have made at 58 without children.

lotsofpulp 8y ago
The article is comparing pay gap between married partners. Those who have children when they are younger are much less likely to be highly educated or be in high paying careers to begin with, and they're not likely to be in a relationship with someone who is either. Lower pay in general implies lower variance since they're not likely to be moving up the ranks into $100k, $150k, $200k+ careers.
tomp 8y ago
> It's somewhat surprising that younger ages, especially 18 to 25, do not have this effect Not really. My hunch is that it's due to two reasons: (1) education is often much less intensive than a competitive career, so it's much earier to study while having a child (in many cases, you don't even need to attend the lectures, just pass the exams!); (2) probably the much bigger reason is that the "have children before 25" sample includes mostly people in non-professional careers where there isn't a lot of room for advancement anyways... someone with 2 years of experience as a store clerk or receptionist is worth about the same as someone with 4 years of experience, whereas the worth is significantly different in something like medicine, investment banking, programming, ...