New graduates, fathers earn 21% more than mothers

Becoming a parent widens the wage gap between men and women. Fathers earn more than mothers, even among recent graduates. This indication emerges from Almalaurea data one year after graduation. In reality, the percentage of mothers and fathers is low in their survey: 3 per cent among men and 5 per cent among women (2025 Report on the employment status of graduates). Among these few, however, two interesting results can be observed.

The first is yet another confirmation of the fact that parenthood widens the gender pay gap, which increases from 9% of recent graduates without children to 21% of graduates with children. The second result, on the other hand, is unusual in the literature: the positive effects of parenthood do not only manifest themselves on male pay (confirming the effect known as the paternity premium) but also extend to female pay, reversing the effect known as the maternity penalty. In fact, the published data, referring only to full-time employees who started their current job after graduation, show that both fathers and mothers earn more than their childless colleagues: for the male component, the average net monthly wage is €1,846 for fathers and €1,612 for childless graduates, while for the female component it is €1,529 for mothers and €1,486 for childless graduates.

The literature on the paternity premium has shown that the increase in pay observed in much research is not a causal effect (procreation, as such, does not increase productivity) but results from the selection that occurs when graduates with children have different characteristics from those without children, and those employed who become fathers are predominantly the same as those who were already better paid before paternity.

The novelty of the Almalaurea data is that this positive selection effect also emerges for the female component and, albeit with due caution due to small numbers, this result is interesting because it is not an isolated case. Other studies, in fact, confirm the presence of a wage premium for mothers in particular contexts, such as strong family networks, stable jobs in well-paid sectors and Stem professions, as highlighted in a study by Claudia Buchmann and Anne McDaniel entitled 'Motherhood and the wages of women in professional occupations'.