Work-Family Conflict in the Federal Workforce: How Race and Gender Impacts Elder-Care Responsibilities

Abstract

Decades of scholarship have highlighted the impact of work-family conflict. While most of the literature has focused on child-care responsibilities, very little research in public administration has explored elder-care responsibilities. Using a sub-sample of civil servants employed by a large federal organization who responded “yes” to having elder-care responsibilities (n = 491), this study identifies employees who are most impacted by providing elder care. Findings suggest that individual characteristics such as age, marital status, gender, and race/ethnicity, as well as occupational variables such as tenure duration, satisfaction with family-friendly policies, and turnover intentions, significantly impacted those civil servants with elder-care responsibilities.

Keywords

work-family conflict elder-care responsibilities adult dependent care gender race or ethnicity age

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