Return-to-Office Is Pushing Women Out of Work

When employers demand that people return to the office full-time, who pays the biggest price?
In this episode of MissPerceived, Professor Leah Ruppanner responds to a listener whose partner is being called back into the office — and whose family is already feeling the consequences. Leah explores what the research says about remote and flexible work, why it became essential for so many mothers’ employment during the pandemic, and why return-to-office mandates risk pushing women out of the workforce again.
But flexibility is not a simple fix. Leah unpacks the flexibility paradox: working from home can help women stay employed and manage caregiving, but it can also stretch the workday into early mornings, late nights, and an exhausting always-on cycle of paid work, parenting, housework, and guilt.
She also explains the unequal career trade-offs families make. Too often, women make career compromises “for the family,” while men are encouraged to accelerate their careers as breadwinners — even when both parents genuinely want more time with their children. The result is a gendered mental load, unequal long-term earnings, and a system that asks mothers to hold work and family together at once.
Chapters:
00:00 A listener asks: What happens when a partner is called back to the office?
01:30 Why return-to-office mandates can hurt women’s careers
02:20 Before COVID, men had greater access to remote and flexible work
03:00 The pandemic’s “exposure effect” — proving work could happen outside the office
04:39 How flexible work helped mothers remain employed
06:44 Why working from home is essential — and why it is not enough
07:30 The flexibility paradox: a resource that expands the workday
09:06 Remote work, maternal guilt, and never being able to clock out
10:00 The career trade-offs women make “for the family”
11:25 Why men and women often make different work decisions for the same family
13:44 Flexible work helps dads care more — without sacrificing their careers
14:30 Class differences in who can access flexibility and who faces job disruption
15:30 The gendered mental load of holding work and family together
Research Mentioned:
📘 For the Family: How Class, Gender, and the Family Shape Women’s Work by Sarah Damaske
📚 Research by Professor Heejung Chung on the “flexibility paradox”
📊 Research by Leah Ruppanner, Kristin Landevar, Katie Collins, William Scarborough, Lauren Ryan, and Brendan Churchill on flexible work, caregiving, and employment
📘 Drained: Reduce Your Mental Load to Do Less and Be More by Professor Leah Ruppanner
Stay Connected with Leah:
Instagram: @prof.leahruppanner
Instagram: @lightenlab
TikTok: @prof.leahruppanner
Website: leahruppanner.com
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