Employer childcare and flexible working in Germany and the United States: How relevant are female leaders and organised labour?

Abstract This study examines how public policy and organisational characteristics relate to employer family policies, applying a theory-testing approach at the meso (employer) level. Expanding debates in comparative research on employer behaviour, we distinguish analytically between normative and economic logics and assess their explanatory relevance across policy contexts. Comparing Germany (IAB Establishment Panel) and the United States (National Study of Employers), the findings indicate that normative logics better explain employer-provided childcare, which is more prevalent in Germany, where economic pressure should generally be lower. By contrast, economic logics better explain employer-provided flexible working in the absence of public flexible-work policy. However, when examining female leadership and organised labour at the organisational level, the expected alignment between policy context and dominant logic does not always hold. Taken together, the findings show that meso-level tests of competing logics can clarify how employee segments relate to employer family policies across contexts.