They balanced life and work. Now more women are quitting. Here's why

For a while, having it all seemed almost possible. 

The COVID-19 pandemic ushered in a new era of flexible work schedules and remote and hybrid work arrangements. More women – especially mothers with young kids – found they could juggle full-time jobs with their responsibilities at home, and fewer dropped out of the workforce to care for children and family members. 

Then in 2025, more than 455,000 women left the workforce. Now, a national survey casts a light on what drove that decision for many women.

Nearly half of the women who voluntarily left said they did so because of their caregiving responsibilities and the high cost and limited availability of child care, according to a survey from women’s advocacy group Catalyst.

Forced into 'impossible decisions'

Sheila Brassel, a research director at Catalyst, said women's workforce participation has begun to lag because flexibility in the workplace is vanishing.

More companies are dialing back flexible work schedules and mandating that employees return to the office part-time or full-time, forcing women into tough situations. More than a third of women who left the workforce voluntarily reported working in jobs without flexibility, the Catalyst survey found. 

These women are not quitting their jobs because they lack ambition, Brassel said, but because they lack options.

"Our data clearly shows that women are not opting out or leaning back from their careers. What we are really seeing is this is a structural issue. Without having the supports in place to navigate these caregiving responsibilities and really rigid, confined work schedules, women are needing to make impossible decisions," she told USA TODAY.

Leaving the workforce, even for a short time, is a difficult decision that can have long-term consequences on women’s career trajectories and prime earnings years, Brassel said, but women are torn "between someone who is reliant on you for their care and well-being and being able to show up at work."

'Sandwich generation' at risk

Though research shows that the lion’s share of responsibilities falls to women, caregiving is not just a woman's problem. 

America is aging rapidly, and more Americans are joining the "sandwich generation" by simultaneously caring for children and parents.

A Harvard Business School study found that 3 in 4 employees have some kind of caregiving responsibility. Nearly a third had voluntarily left a job during their career because of it, with even higher percentage of senior-level employees doing so.

More companies are providing paid family caregiving leave, which employees can use to care for an aging parent, a family member with a serious illness, or a loved one recovering from surgery or hospitalization, according to Sparrow, a leave management company. In addition, 14 states now offer paid family leave insurance programs that cover family caregiving. 

Caregiving has grown from 2.4% of all leave claims in 2020 to 6% in 2025 – a 150% increase. The median length of these leaves has nearly quadrupled.

"This suggests that employees are increasingly managing extended care situations − exactly the scenarios that, without proper leave support, force talented workers into chronic stress and burnout or out of the workforce entirely," Sparrow said in a report on employee leave released this week.

But for many organizations, caregiving remains a blind spot. More than half of employers do not track data on their employees’ caregiving responsibilities, the Harvard Business School study found.

What employers can do right now to help caregivers

Employers should take immediate steps to support employees, especially women who make up half of the labor force, Brassel said. 

"We're seeing a return to traditional 9-5 in-office work, which will likely cause a resurgence in the burdens women face navigating caregiving and careers and result in women needing to leave their jobs," she said. Brassel recommends offering flexible schedules so that employees don’t have to choose between caregiving and work. 

She said other policies that relieve caregiving pressures on employees – such as paid emergency care days, financial subsidies, and on-site childcare – can boost retention.

She also urges regular audits to ensure fair pay and career growth for women. Nearly 1 in 5 of women who voluntarily left their jobs reported that pay was a factor in their decision to leave the workforce, the Catalyst survey found.