--- title: Women Are Even More Burned Out on the Job Than They Were a Year Ago description: The pandemic has caused more women in the workplace to feel burned out. Job burnout for men is rising too, but not as much as women. authors: - name: Mallika Mitra role: Contributing Editor url: https://money.com/author/mallika-mitra/ bio: Mallika Mitra is a contributing editor for Money, based in Chicago. She has covered investing and retirement for seven years and her work has appeared in CNBC, Bloomberg, Kiplinger, AARP, Barron’s, Bankrate, The Daily Upside, ETF.com, The Bond Buyer, PLANADVISER, PLANSPONSOR and Investopedia. education: Craig Newmark Graduate School of Journalism at CUNY Kalamazoo College at_money_since: 2020 articles: 395 covers: - Career Advice - Banking - Business - Credit - Credit Cards - Debt - Economy and Politics - Education - Health and Wellness - Housing - Identity Theft - Insurance - Investing - Lifestyle - Loans - Mortgages - Personal Finance - Pets - Professional Services - Retirement - Shopping - Taxes - Technology also_seen_in: - CNBC - Bloomberg - Kiplinger - Barron's - Bankrate - WGN-TV - CBS News Radio - This Morning With Gordon Deal - Everyone's Talkin' Money social: - https://twitter.com/mitra_mallika - https://www.linkedin.com/in/mallika-mitra-4577a386/ published: '2021-09-27T16:28:33.000Z' modified: '2024-05-08T05:46:25.000Z' section: Career Advice tags: - News word_count: 501 canonical: https://money.com/job-burnout-women-men-pandemic/ type: NewsArticle source: structured-blocks --- > **Disclosure:** We research all brands listed and may earn a fee from our partners. Research and financial considerations may influence how brands are displayed. Not all brands are included. [Learn more](https://money.com/page/disclaimer/). ![Woman closes her eyes while working late on her computer in a dark room with a clock that reads 21:11 hours.](https://img.money.com/2021/09/News-Burnout-Rates-Spiking-For-Women-Workplace.jpg) Job burnout is real — especially for women. Burnout is escalating much faster among women than men, with 42% of women reporting being burned out compared to 35% of men, according to the seventh annual [report on women in the workplace](https://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/women-are-rising-to-be-the-leaders-companies-need-but-work-is-going-unrecognized-and-unrewarded-301385208.html) from McKinsey & Company and LeanIn.Org. The gap has nearly doubled from a year ago when 32% of women and 28% of men reported job burnout. A few months into the pandemic, one in four women said they had considered downshifting their careers or leaving the workforce for a year. Now, that number has jumped to one in three women, according to the study, which includes data and insight from 423 companies representing more than 12 million people and survey responses from 65,000 individual employees. The pandemic took its toll on employees, with millions losing their jobs and many unexpectedly shifting to remote working, [putting in more hours](https://money.com/work-from-home-longer-hours/) than they did before the pandemic. But for women, the situation is especially dire. Research shows women were hit harder than men by the layoffs, and that they took on [more of the childcare responsibilities](https://www.wiareport.com/2020/07/gender-differences-in-the-economic-and-social-impact-of-the-covid-19-pandemic/) when schools and daycares closed. Millions of women who left the workforce during the pandemic [haven't returned](https://www.npr.org/2021/06/03/1002402802/there-are-complex-forces-keeping-women-from-coming-back-to-work), and many of those who are working have been [unable to find jobs of the same status or pay](https://www.wsj.com/articles/working-mothers-derailed-by-pandemic-face-a-tough-road-11618185600/?mod=article_inline) that they had before 2020. ## What's causing job burnout? So what's the main factor explaining burnout in the workplace? The feeling of needing to be constantly "on," according to the study. While most employees have the flexibility to take time off from work — or at least step away from the computer for a bit — more than a third feel as though they need to be available 24/7. Nearly half think that they need to work long hours to get ahead. Women of color face even more challenges that eventually lead to burnout. In general, women who are one of the only women in the room at work face challenges like being interrupted and having their judgement questioned. The problems are even worse for women who are the only representatives of their race at work. Those "double onlys" — as the report calls them — are even more likely to experience burnout. Being a mother to young children just compounds the issue, with 47% of mothers with young children feeling burned out often or almost always. Meanwhile, 55% of mothers of young children who are the lone woman in their workplace feel this way. Companies are attempting to fix the problem with mental health benefits, additional support for parents and caregivers and offering more paid leave, according to the study. But as burnout continues to increase among women, employers will need to listen closely to their employees and experiment with creative solutions. ```json { "@context": "https://schema.org", "@graph": [ { "@type": "BreadcrumbList", "@id": "https://money.com/job-burnout-women-men-pandemic/#breadcrumb", "itemListElement": [ { "@type": "ListItem", "position": 1, "name": "Home", "item": "https://money.com" }, { "@type": "ListItem", "position": 2, "name": "Career Advice", "item": "https://money.com/career-advice/" }, { "@type": "ListItem", "position": 3, "name": "Employment", "item": "https://money.com/employment/" }, { "@type": "ListItem", "position": 4, "name": "Women Are Even More Burned Out on the Job Than They Were a Year Ago" } ] }, { "@type": "WebSite", "@id": "https://money.com/#website", "url": "https://money.com", "name": "Money", "publisher": { "@id": "https://money.com/#organization" } }, { "@type": "WebPage", "@id": "https://money.com/job-burnout-women-men-pandemic/#webpage", "url": "https://money.com/job-burnout-women-men-pandemic/", "name": "Women Are Even More Burned Out on the Job Than They Were a Year Ago", "isPartOf": { "@id": "https://money.com/#website" }, "datePublished": "2021-09-27T16:28:33.000Z", "mainEntity": { "@id": "https://money.com/job-burnout-women-men-pandemic/" }, "inLanguage": "en-US", "breadcrumb": { "@id": "https://money.com/job-burnout-women-men-pandemic/#breadcrumb" }, "dateModified": "2024-05-08T05:46:25.000Z" }, { "@type": "NewsArticle", "headline": "Women Are Even More Burned Out on the Job Than They Were a Year Ago", "articleSection": "Career Advice", "image": [ { "@type": "ImageObject", "url": "https://img.money.com/2021/09/News-Burnout-Rates-Spiking-For-Women-Workplace.jpg", "width": 2200, "height": 1467, "caption": "News-Burnout-Rates-Spiking-For-Women-Workplace" } ], "author": [ { "@type": "Person", "name": "Mallika Mitra", "url": "https://money.com/author/mallika-mitra/", "@id": "https://money.com/author/mallika-mitra/#author", "description": "Mallika Mitra is a contributing editor for Money, based in Chicago. 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