Chart: Presence of young children has opposite effects on mothers’ and fathers’ labor force participation: U.S. labor force participation by gender and parental status, 2025

Figure D

Presence of young children has opposite effects on mothers' and fathers' labor force participation: U.S. labor force participation by gender and parental status, 2025

	Men	Women
All	89.4%	79.8%
Workers with no young children	88.1%	79.9%
Workers with young children	95.7%	69.3%

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Note: Sample limited to people ages 25–54. Young children are defined as being less than 6 years old.

Source: EPI analysis of the Current Population Survey (CPS) basic monthly microdata, EPI Current Population Survey Extracts, Version 2026.2.12, https://microdata.epi.org.

This chart appears in:

What is the gender pay gap and is it real?: The complete guide to how women are paid less than men and why it can’t be explained away
UN Pay Gap charts (Elise)

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