Around 2% of all self-employed women have a child every year. About a quarter of these women have health insurance with daily sickness benefits, which are paid during the maternity protection period. The benefits paid by health insurance companies for this are in the low millions.
According to calculations by the IfM Bonn, insuring the loss of income of all self-employed women during the maternity protection period would cost between 149 and 229 million euros a year. Dr Rosemarie Kay presented this data at the workshop "Maternity protection for the self-employed - needs and ideas" organised by the Federal Ministry for Economic Affairs and Climate Action and the Federal Ministry for Family Affairs, Senior Citizens, Women and Youth in Berlin at the beginning of June.
