Not Ideal: The Association Between Working Anything but Full Time and Perceived Unfair Treatment

Abstract

Ideal-worker norms permeate workplaces, guiding employers’ evaluation of workers and perceptions of workers’ worth. The authors investigate how an ideal-worker norm violation—working anything but full time—affects workers’ perception of unfair treatment. The authors assess gender and parental status differences in the relationship. Analyses using Midlife Development in the United States II data reveal that women who violate the norm when they have children perceive greater unfair treatment than women who violate the norm but do not have children in the study period. Men who work anything but full time do not perceive unfair treatment. The authors’ findings inform efforts to challenge ideal-worker norms.