More Dutch dads take paternity leave

More and more new Dutch fathers are making use of their paternity leave, though the number that do is still relatively small. Over the past decade the percentage almost doubled, according to figures BNR requested from Statistic Netherlands. Currently 11 percent of new fathers in the Netherlands take paternity leave, compared to 6 percent a decade ago. While there a significant increase can be seen, it is still clearly the minority of dads that take time off to spend with their new child. Among new mothers, 22 percent now take maternity leave, compared to 13 percent ten years ago. Remarkably the figures show that the number of people in need of paternity or maternity leave, but who did not take it, hasn't decreased over the past 10 years. Men often state that taking leave will be bad for their career. For women it is most often financial reasons. The figures also show that working part-time after a child is born is still a thing that mostly mothers do. Young fathers even tend to be more likely to work a full-time job after a child is born. According to Statistics Netherlands economist Peter Hein van Milligen, this shows that a career is still a bit more important to young men than young women.