Are Companies Offering Abortion Benefits Attracting More Talent?

A new study has found that companies that promoted abortion-related benefits after the overturning of Roe v Wade last year saw an increase in interest for their job postings, but a decline in worker satisfaction, particularly among men.

Following the June 24, 2022 Dobbs v Jackson Supreme Court ruling, which overturned the federal right to abortion established in Roe v Wade, hundreds of employers publicly announced policies covering out-of-state employee travel for abortions and related care, including Meta, JP Morgan and Disney.

Using data from job site Indeed and employer review site Glassdoor, the study’s authors, Pawel Adrjan, Svenja Gudell and others, found companies with more female and more Democratic-leaning employees and executives were more likely to announce such policies.

We’ve Got You Covered: Employer and Employee Responses to Dobbs v. Jackson, published by IZA, a German nonprofit research institute, looked at the impact such announcements had on recruitment, job satisfaction, and pay.

Male v female reactions

They found that, for companies that made such announcements, their vacancies received more job seeker interest, particularly in blue-leaning states and in female-dominated jobs in states with trigger laws that outlawed abortion.

But they also found that satisfaction with management among existing employees, particularly in male dominated jobs, declined.

What’s more, posted wages increased, especially for those companies where employee sentiment declined.

The results, the authors conclude, “highlight the complicated trade-off employers face from engaging in socio-political dialogue, in particular how signals of company culture can help recruit new workers but alienate current ones”.

The researchers used data from Indeed to examine whether a job seeker clicks on the job posting of a given employer. Before Dobbs, clicks on job advertisements for announcing firms trended similarly to those for non-announcing firms.

But after Dobbs, clicks on postings by firms that announced reproductive care policies increased by 8% compared with similar firms that did not announce.

That’s a big difference, equivalent to the increase in clicks that would result from a 12 percent increase in the posted wage.

The increase in clicks was especially pronounced for job postings advertising female-dominated roles in trigger states where abortion was automatically banned.

Worker satisfaction

In contrast, job satisfaction cues gleaned from Glassdoor reviews suggest that announcing reproductive care in the wake of Dobbs reduced worker satisfaction, both with the job and the firm, including a marked 8 percent decline in ratings for senior management.

“To put this number in context, this decline is larger in magnitude than that observed following news that one’s company engaged in tax avoidance, or the public revelation of corporate misconduct,” says the report, citing earlier studies.

The drop in satisfaction was more pronounced in male dominated jobs.

Looking at reviews on Glassdoor, it found suggestive evidence of what might be driving this decline––“newfound political misalignment”.

For example, the word “woke” showed up 325 percent more often in the “cons” section for announcing firms, compared with non-announcing firms.

“While this average deterioration in job satisfaction could be driven by a vocal minority, it nonetheless reflects disgruntlement by at least some subset of the firm’s workforce,” they report.

Finally, the authors found that announcing firms increased posted wages on Indeed by 4 percent relative to non-announcing firms.

The increase was larger in firms that experienced more severe declines in existing employee satisfaction, suggesting a potential compensating wage differential explanation for the growth in wages.

Announcements to cover travel expenses for abortion and related care are facilitating worker sorting across gender and political lines, say the authors, “meaningfully altering labor market dynamics across the United States”.

Moreover, “some existing – likely male – employees are more dissatisfied with their firms after the announcement, but this is offset by increased interest overall, and in particular from women and seemingly co-partisan workers aligned with the firm’s publicly announced political values”.

If you’re looking for an employer who has your back, here are three to consider, with loads more to discover on The Hill Jobs Board.

Global Security Operations Center and Systems Manager, Airbnb

Airbnb Inc is reported to cover US employees who need to travel to receive medical care, including abortion, if access is restricted where they live. It currently has a vacancy for a Global Security Operations Center and Systems Manager in San Francisco.

SAP Security Solution Consultant, Deloitte

Deloitte US is looking for a SAP Security Solution Consultant to join its team in Houston, Texas, as part of its Government and Public Services Cyber Practice. The company has also been reported as helping to cover travel for employees who need health care procedures not provided locally.

KPMG

Fellow professional services firm KPMG US is also reported to cover abortion-related travel and accommodation expenses. As one of the world’s leading professional services firms and the fastest growing Big Four accounting firm in the United States, it has over 75 offices and more than 40,000 employees and partners throughout the nation. Discover more about a career at KPMG here.

For hundreds more opportunities and to find a role that fits, visit The Hill Jobs Board today