Motherhood Gap and Employer Discrimination. A Qualitative Investigation in the German Context

Motherhood penalty has often been considered the base for the wage gap and the glass ceiling phenomena. It represents a delicate topic in gender equality since its effects tend to persist over medium to long time periods and its validity holds in most countries. The study has been designed to investigate the specific contribution of employer discrimination to the overall motherhood penalty in socioeconomic contexts characterized by the archetype of the “male breadwinner model”, which has been further exacerbated by the recent Covid-19 pandemic.