The third shift: Multiple job holding and the incarceration of women's partners

A large body of research documents the sensitivity of women's employment to changing family circumstances, but we know little about the relationship between partner incarceration a common family transition in the lives of disadvantaged women and employment. Despite reasons to suspect that changes in resources associated with incarceration have consequences for the employment of family members, previous research suggests that partner incarceration does not influence the number of hours women work at their main jobs. This paper uses data from the Fragile Families and Child Wellbeing Study (N = 3835) to examine how partner incarceration is associated with multiple job holding, an alternative strategy for increasing earnings. Results show that women with incarcerated partners are more likely to work multiple jobs than women in otherwise similar circumstances, suggesting partner incarceration is linked to a "third shift" to additional employment on top of the paid work and caregiving women already do.