IMPACT OF SCHOOL REOPENINGS ON WORKING MOTHERS’ FINANCIAL DISTRESS

School closures during the Covid-19 pandemic worsened employment outcomes for working mothers. Many working mothers decreased their total working hours in order to accommodate needed care, and childcare costs also increased. The Capstone team sought to investigate whether school reopenings—and the return of accessible childcare infrastructure—made a meaningful difference in the financial distress of working mothers. Using the Household Pulse Surveys from August 2020 to April 2021, the team used a difference-in-differences model and found that school reopenings did not have a statistically significant impact on the financial distress of working mothers. However, race, education, and income levels of working mothers were found to be statistically significantly correlated with the financial distress of working mothers during the Covid-19 pandemic. This has deep policy implications as it shows that an absence of childcare infrastructure can have a lasting impact on the financial distress of working mothers and that the impact may be worse for those with a lower socioeconomic status or those within racially marginalized communities.