“WOMEN FOR SUSTAINABLE WORLD” PROJECT
In European economic debates, policymakers often focus on the energy transition, industrial competitiveness, or fiscal strategy. Yet a silent phenomenon has emerged as one of the deepest and least visible social fractures of our time: the rise of fixed expenses that wipes out the real income of single mothers.
Housing, childcare, transport: long considered basic living costs, these three pillars have become the core of an economic mechanism that structurally weakens a significant part of the working population.
In Europe, around 12–14% of households with children are single-parent families, and the overwhelming majority of them are headed by women (European Commission). Across Europe, the evidence is consistent: these families face the highest poverty risks, often nearly double that of couple households.
The paradox is stark: they work more, but earn less in real terms.
1. The invisible inflation: the rise of non-negotiable expenses
The issue is not only income, it is the shrinking disposable income that remains after essential costs.
- In major European cities, single mothers can spend 40–60% of their budget on housing (Make Mothers Matter).
- Childcare costs have risen faster than wages in many OECD countries. In the United States, childcare expenses increased by 29% between 2020 and 2024, and annual costs for two young children can exceed $25,000 (Center for American Progress).
Transport costs, especially for jobs located in peripheral zones or with atypical hours, compound the problem.
The equation becomes brutally simple: each hour of work may yield almost nothing once fixed costs are deducted.
Economists call this a “structural overload trap”.
This is not a micro-social detail. It is a macroeconomic issue that affects labor participation, productivity, fertility, and ultimately the sustainability of social systems.
2. A European problem with global repercussions
The same patterns appear across the world:
- In the OECD, children living in single-parent families face a much higher poverty risk than the average.
- Global analyses estimate that around 8% of households worldwide are single-parent households, and 84% are led by women (Make Mothers Matter).
Everywhere, the same dynamic unfolds: fixed costs rise faster than income, and public or market services (affordable housing, childcare, mobility) fail to keep pace.
3. When fathers leave: the economics of abandonment
This fracture is not only financial, it is relational.
Across countries, the vast majority of single-parent households are headed by mothers, which means that many fathers leave the home, the partner, and the children, often rebuilding a new life and sometimes a new family elsewhere.
The data is unequivocal:
1. Children pay the price of paternal absence.
Meta-analyses show that father absence is associated with higher stress, increased anxiety disorders, and lower average academic performance.
- Mothers bear a double burden: economic and psychological.
Studies on breakups during pregnancy and postpartum show a clear link between separation, lack of partner support, and increased psychological distress, depressive symptoms, and chronic fatigue.
In other words, abandonment is not merely a moral failure, it produces a documented health and economic shock for both mother and child that can last for years.
4. When a parent leaves and “starts over”: not even child support compensates for the impact
When a parent leaves the household, builds a new life elsewhere, and leaves the other parent to shoulder the full weight of raising children alone, the consequences go far beyond finances.
Research is unequivocal: even when child support is paid, the impact of abandonment remains profound.
According to the London School of Economics, once a father leaves the household, even if he remains “present” on paper, children do not experience the developmental gains seen in stable two-parent households. And when a new partner enters the mother’s life, “children do no better than those whose father was never present.”
Meta-analyses confirm that family recomposition often exposes children to higher instability, more stress, more anxiety, and more academic difficulties.
For the parent who stays (overwhelmingly the mother) the consequences are even heavier: permanent mental load, unilateral decision-making, logistical exhaustion, economic pressure, and sole responsibility in every emergency.
Studies show that this type of abandonment significantly increases the risks of psychological distress, chronic fatigue, and administrative overload.
The truth is brutal but undeniable:
When a parent walks away and rebuilds somewhere else, they do not erase the impact of their departure.
Even with child support payments, the parent who leaves takes their personal freedom, and the parent who stays inherits every bill: financial, emotional, educational, medical, social.
5. What jurisprudence does (or does not) recognise
On paper, in nearly all European countries, the non-resident parent has a legal obligation to contribute financially to the child’s upbringing.
In practice, several problems persist:
- A cross-country comparison of 21 European states shows that the share of single mothers who actually receive child support ranges from 16% to 75%, with an average of around one-third (Cambridge University Press).
- In France, studies show that only a minority of single mothers report receiving child support, severely limiting the protective effects of the law (Sciences Po).
- In the UK, civil society reports document hundreds of millions of pounds of unpaid child maintenance, despite a public enforcement system (Gingerbread).
The question “should jurisprudence account for this?” opens three urgent fronts:
1. Recognising the invisible damage.
Courts sometimes acknowledge “moral harm” or “anxiety harm,” but the chronic stress of abandonment and unilateral parenting is rarely quantified despite extensive scientific evidence.
2. Moving from theoretical obligation to real enforcement.
Effective tools exist:
- automatic wage or tax withholding,
- temporary state advance payments with later recovery,
- stronger sanctions for repeated non-payment.
3. Aligning law with ethical reality.
Law cannot force affection, but it can send a clear signal that total abandonment of financial and practical care is not neutral, and that society recognises the long-term cost carried by the parent who stays.
6. An economic issue, not a moral debate
This is not about idealising one family model or criticising recomposed families.
It is about recognising the economic cost of repeated parental abandonment, a phenomenon that has become almost “normalised.”
The macroeconomic impacts are well-documented:
- lower labor participation among mothers,
- underutilisation of qualified female talent,
- increased child poverty and long-term exclusion,
- higher reliance on public transfers amid fiscal pressures.
This is not a private or moral issue.
It is an issue of productivity, social stability, and fiscal sustainability.
7. Solutions: pragmatic, measurable, non-ideological
No miracle reform exists, but several proven levers do.
a) Housing: secure the residential trajectories of single-parent families
- Allocate a share of social or affordable housing to single parents in employment or returning to work.
- Introduce “accompanied rehousing” mechanisms for families facing past arrears.
b) Childcare: from subsidies to real services
- Expand childcare options with early-morning, late-evening, and weekend hours.
- Develop neighbourhood-level or workplace-based cooperative models.
c) Mobility: treat commuting as a cost of production
- Subsidise the total commuting cost for essential workers.
- Ensure that jobs outside city centres remain accessible to parents without cars.
d) Family law and child support: enforcement first
- Simplify child support determination and revision procedures.
- Automate enforcement to end the burden of constant pursuit.
- Align child support with social benefits so each euro paid benefits the child.
8. ESG’s role in this landscape
ESG is often reduced to climate issues, yet the S (Social) pillar can be powerful here.
Companies can:
- partner with local childcare providers,
- offer structured flexibility (partial remote work, adaptable hours),
- track indicators on work–life balance in ESG reporting,
- link parts of executive remuneration to reducing parenthood-related career gaps.
For investors, this is not charity: companies that support single-parent employees gain in productivity, talent retention, and reputation.
ESG does not replace public policy or family law, but it can accelerate best practices and make visible the reality that the cost of abandonment should not fall solely on mothers.
9. A test of economic maturity for Europe
The situation of single mothers is not just another “social issue.” It is a test of economic maturity.
It reveals what macroeconomic indicators often obscure: whether a society truly enables each person to live from their work without being crushed by fixed expenses beyond their control.
The question facing Europe and the world is simple:
Can we still call an economy “sustainable” when those keeping their families afloat are precisely those for whom work pays the least, financially and psychologically?
That is where the debate should begin.
Sources
- Eurostat, People at risk of poverty or social exclusion in 2024 (news release, 2025).
- Eurostat, Children at risk of poverty or social exclusion (tableaux en ligne).
- UNICEF, The State of Children in the European Union, 2024.
- OECD, Society at a Glance 2024 et base Family Database / SF1.2 Children in families.
- Make Mothers Matter, Single Mothers within the European Union (2022) et Mothers’ Poverty in the EU (2025).
- Nieuwenhuis, R. (2021), Directions of thought for single parents in the EU, Community, Work & Family, tandfonline.com
- Hakovirta, M. (2022), Lone mothers and child support receipt in 21 European countries, Journal of International and Comparative Social Policy, Cambridge University Press & Assessment
- European Parliament, Child maintenance systems in EU Member States (2014 study).
- Sciences Po, Child Support: why isn’t it more common and significant in France?, Cogito, 2023.
- Chavda, K. (2023), Single Parenting: Impact on Child’s Development, Journal of Health Management, journals.sagepub.com
- Guo, S. (2020), Meta-Analysis of Direct and Indirect Effects of Father Absence, Frontiers in Psychology, pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov
- Negussie, A. (2023), Pregnant women’s lived experiences of partner relationship breakup, BMC Pregnancy and Childbirth, pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov
- Sobol, M. (2023), Couples’ time perspective and pregnant women’s mental health, Journal of Psychiatric Research, sciencedirect.com
- Center for American Progress, Child Care Expenses Push an Estimated 134,000 Families into Poverty Each Year, 2024.
- The Century Foundation, Child Care Funding Cliff at One Year: Rising Prices, Fewer Options, 2024.