2021年经济学人 巴托比职场专栏--女性高管的境况(2)（在线收听）

But there is still a long way to go. Only 27% of American employers offered paid parental leave in 2019. That may be up from 17% in 2016, but still leaves a lot of mothers uncovered. Even where leave is available, many women don’t take full advantage. A survey of female tech-industry employees in 2018 found that 44% of women who had taken maternity leave had taken off less time than their entitlement because they thought a longer break would damage their careers.

但仍有很长的路要走。2019年，只有27%的美国雇主提供带薪产假，这可能比2016年的17%有所上升，但仍有很多母亲没有涵盖在内。即使公司提供带薪育儿假，很多女性也没有充分休满。2018年，一项针对科技行业女性员工的调查发现，44%休产假女性的休假时间少于应得的时间，因为她们认为更长的休假时间会损害自己的职业生涯。

Working mothers are still overloaded. Mothers who are employed full-time spend nearly two-thirds more of their day feeding, bathing and caring for their children (under six) than their employed husbands do. They still struggle with guilt. One executive was on the phone with an important client in her locked office, only for an impatient toddler to bang on the door and repeatedly scream, “You don’t love me.” Unsurprisingly, a study found that chronic stress levels are 40% higher in women who are employed and bringing up two children than in childless working women. Worse still, female employees routinely toiling more than 60 hours a week were more than three times as likely to develop heart disease, cancer or diabetes than those on a conventional 40-hour schedule.

职场母亲仍然负担过重。相较于工作的丈夫，全职工作的母亲每天多花近三分之二的时间来哺乳、洗澡和照顾孩子（6岁以下）。她们仍在内疚中挣扎。一位高管在锁着的办公室里和一位重要客户通电话，结果自己蹒跚学步的孩子不耐烦地使劲敲门，不停地尖叫着：“你根本不爱我。”不出所料，一项研究发现，抚养两个孩子的职业女性的慢性压力水平比没有孩子的职业女性高出40%。更糟糕的是，每周工作时间超过60小时的女性员工患心脏病、癌症或糖尿病的几率是传统的工作40小时的三倍多。

Despite the advances made by female executives, things are even more difficult for the vast majority of working mothers. Many work in smaller businesses, where maternity benefits and flexible hours are less likely to be available. Many are in low-paid jobs, or in sectors like health care and retailing, where it has been impossible to work remotely during the pandemic. The author writes that “nothing is more essential to an employed mother’s professional success than reliable high-quality child care”, and for many women who are not executives, this is a constant headache.

尽管女性高管取得了很大进步，但绝大多数职场母亲面临着更为困难的情况。许多职场女性在小型企业工作，那里不太可能提供产假福利和弹性工作时间。许多职场女性从事低薪工作，或从事医疗保健和零售业等行业，但这些岗位在疫情期间无法提供远程办公机会。作者写道，“对于一个事业有成的职场妈妈来说，没有什么比可靠的高质量育儿服务更重要了”，而对于许多非高管的女性来说，这个问题却经常令她们头痛。

It is good news that many more women have climbed the corporate ladder, not just in terms of fairness, but because an economy should take advantage of all its potential talent. There needs to be a lot more progress made in helping the vast majority of women to juggle their home and work lives, not least by providing affordable child care. There are many more cleaners, cooks and carers than there are chief executives.

好消息是，越来越多的女性事业有成，这不仅仅是因为公平，而是因为一个经济体应该充分利用其所有潜在的人才。在帮助绝大多数女性兼顾家庭和工作生活方面，还需要取得更多进展，尤其是提供负担得起的儿童保育。毕竟女性清洁工、厨师和护理人员比首席执行官要多得多。