It’s become an unfortunate yet well-documented truth that having a baby can impact a woman’s career. A 2025 survey found that 87% of working mothers say they’ve missed promotions or opportunities due to becoming a mom, while 90% said they had to adjust their career path because of parenthood – with 59% changing industries altogether.
Enter: family influencing. According to a 2025 review published in Sage Journals, over the past five years, there has been a 101.6% increase in mom-influencers on social media.
The baby-to-influencer pipeline
Journalist Fortesa Latifi explores this phenomenon in her new book Like, Follow, Subscribe: Influencer Kids and the Cost of a Childhood Online. She told Fast Company that, given so much is stacked against women who have children when it comes to their work, the pipeline makes sense.
“I think women are drawn to influencing because it’s so difficult to be a working mother in this country,” Latifi explains. “Statistically, many women return to work within weeks of having a baby and childcare costs can often outpace an entire salary. Mothers have lower salaries than women without children, on average.”
One study found that mothers see their incomes decrease by an average of 50% after having children.
Crushing childcare costs
Families report that around 23% of their paychecks go straight to childcare. Working and child-rearing can leave parents, particularly mothers, feeling pulled in two separate directions.
Just last year, around 400,000 women with young children left the workforce – the largest exodus in about 40 years, according to a report from the University of Kansas’ Care Board. Meanwhile, fathers’ labor force participation has remained consistently above 95% for decades.
‘A dream career’
Influencing can seem like “a dream career,” Latifi says. “It promises that your career can unfold alongside your family life as opposed to in contention with it. Ideally, you can stay home with your kids and make more money than you were making before.”
Influencing can bring in thousands, if not hundreds of thousands, in earnings each month. Latifi found that the “highest strata of mom influencers and family vloggers make millions of dollars a year.” One family she interviewed, who goes by the name Family Fun Pack online, makes $8 million yearly.
According to a 2026 report from digital marketing agency Influize, popular influencers can earn $7,000 for a single Instagram reel.
The trade-off
While family influencing offers financial freedom and flexibility, Latifi’s book also raises important questions about children’s privacy, consent, and the long-term effects of growing up online. Children featured in family content may not have a say in how their images are used or how much of their lives is shared with millions of strangers.
Still, for mothers facing a workplace that offers few accommodations for childcare responsibilities, the appeal of influencing is undeniable. As Latifi puts it, it’s a decision she can understand why people make.
