Date of Award

2026

Document Type

Thesis

Degree Name

Bachelor of Science

Department

Mathematical Economics

First Advisor

Dr Melissa Spencer

Third Advisor

Education, maternal childcare, remote work, flexible work, COVID-19

Abstract

This paper examines whether college education shapes working mothers’ access to remote work, flexible working, and childcare hours in the United Kingdom, and whether COVID-19 school closures amplified these inequalities. Using data from the UK Time Use Survey (2016–2021), a repeated cross-sectional diary dataset spanning the pre-pandemic period and five COVID-19 waves, this paper estimates weighted logistic and ordinary least squares regressions on a sample of married or cohabiting, employed mothers. School closures serve as a natural experiment, providing an exogenous shock to caregiving demands that affected all mothers simultaneously regardless of education level. College education significantly predicted working from home during the COVID-19 period, with the education gap in remote work access widening most during the January 2021 school closures. The pre-existing education gap in childcare hours present in 2016 compressed during the COVID-19 period as a whole but re-amplified during school closures. Contrary to expectations, college education did not predict flexible working access, suggesting that education shapes where mothers work but not when. Working from home broadly increased childcare hours during COVID-19, but school closures shifted working from home mothers away from direct hands-on childcare towards passive supervision. College-educated working from home mothers consistently spent fewer hours on childcare than their non-college educated counterparts across all periods, suggesting that college-educated mothers face more demanding remote work schedules, leaving less time for childcare. This paper contributes to UK evidence on how education shapes remote work access and childcare hours among working mothers, highlighting the inequalities the education gap creates in balancing work with childcare.

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