The effect of the timing and spacing of births on the level of labor market involvement of married women

We analyze the effect of the timing and spacing of births on the labor supply of married women in a framework that accounts for the endogeneity of the labor market and fertility decisions, for the heterogeneity of the effects of children on labor supply and their correlation with the fertility decisions, and for the correlation of sequential labor market decisions. Delaying the first birth leads to higher pre-natal levels of labor market involvement and reduces the negative effect of the first child on labor supply. The effect of the second child increases with the spacing of the two births as women, returning to work after the first birth, finance child care time increasingly through reductions in market time. Individual heterogeneity is considerable; women with lower propensity for children have the first birth later in life and space subsequent births more closely together, work more before the birth of the first child, but face larger effects of children on their labor supply.     

Attitude to child-bearing by single Nigerian women

The author examines attitudes toward childbearing by unmarried Nigerian women using data from interviews with a sample of 212 male and female residents of Ibadan, Nigeria, chosen in order to examine the views of educated Nigerians. The respondents were, for the most part, Yorubas, married, and aged 20-40. "In general, the respondents supported the suggestion that women who are unmarried should try and have children of their own, but they are opposed to the suggestion that such women should have as many children as possible, either from the same man or from different men of their choice." The author suggests that "one significant implication of the survey is that the general fertility rate (that is the annual number of births per 1,000 women of reproductive age) may be very high in developing areas not only because married women produce children, but also because women of childbearing ages who are single [are] also encouraged to have children of their own."     

THE EFFECT OF HUSBAND'S JOB DISPLACEMENT ON THE TIMING AND SPACING OF BIRTHS IN THE UNITED STATES

I use husband's job displacement as an exogenous shock to identify the effect of income on the timing and spacing of births. Gradual adjustment of fertility to income shock is considered in life‐cycle model with uncertainty. Flexible hazard model, estimated jointly for the first three births, allows household's fertility to be affected not only in the period of displacement but also before and after. General displacements and layoffs have negative log‐run effect on the timing and spacing of only the first and the third births. The effect persists with nonparametric controls for woman‐ and transition‐specific heterogeneity, and after robustness checks. (JEL J13, J63, C41)     

The determinants of female labour supply in Hungary

The aim of this paper is to closely examine the effect on a married woman's labour supply decision of non-labour income and of her own wage rate in a transition economy. The paper first shows that labour force participation rates for Hungarian females, though decreasing, were still extremely high and comparable to male economic activity in western countries. It then estimates labour supply parameters using a model that controls for sample selection issues associated with the labour supply of married women. Wage elasticity is estimated to be high and positive (1.81) while the income effect is consistent with leisure being a normal good. No sample selection bias is found.     

Housework and the Wages of Young, Middle-Aged, and Older Workers

This article uses samples of young, middle-aged, and older married workers drawn from the Panel Study of Income Dynamics to examine whether the effect of housework time on wages differs among these age groups. Results from OLS, fixed effects, and panel data instrumental variables models show that young and middle-aged wives are the only groups for which the authors find consistent evidence of a housework effect on wages. Each additional hour of housework reduces their wages by 0.1–0.4%. Additionally, the analysis finds evidence that for young workers, housework time is an important determinant of the male/female wage gap. (JEL J16 , J22 , J31 )     

Household formation by the young in the United States

A model of household formation by the young is specified and estimated. It was found that the headship rate for the young in the United States depends on income, the cost of housing, the number of families receiving AFDC payments, the age at first marriage for females and for males, and the percentage of males enrolled in college. Household formation by the young is much more sensitive to changes in income and the price of housing than household formation by the entire adult population. The estimated results are used to examine the change in the headship rate from 1961 to 1979 and from 1979 to 1987.     

Household formation by the young in the United States

"A model of household formation by the young is specified and estimated. It was found that the headship rate for the young in the United States depends on income, the cost of housing, the number of families receiving AFDC payments, the age at first marriage for females and for males, and the percentage of males enrolled in college. Household formation by the young is much more sensitive to changes in income and the price of housing than household formation by the entire adult population. The estimated results are used to examine the change in the headship rate from 1961 to 1979 and from 1979 to 1987."     

婚姻对男性死亡风险的影响——立足于对清代辽东旗人社会的考察

利用中国多世代人口数据库——辽宁部分(CMGPD-LN),运用离散时间事件史分析技术和logit模型,研究了1749-1909年清代辽东旗人社会中男性的婚姻与死亡水平、死亡风险的关系。婚姻对于男性具有保护作用,在婚男性的死亡风险要低于不在婚男性;logit模型结果表明,未婚和丧偶男性的死亡风险要显著高于初婚男性,中青年未婚男性的死亡风险高于初婚男性,而老年未婚男性的死亡风险比初婚男性低。     

Labour participation in Colombia

A model is estimated for the decision of participating in the labour market for different groups of household members: not coupled (single, divorced and widow) women and men and coupled (married and in permanent union) women and men. The differences among these groups are significant. Probit models are estimated for the period 1984?:?1–2000?:?4 using the National Housing Survey. The neoclassical static model performs fairly well in describing the empirical determinants of the decision of participating. In terms of sign and significance of estimated coefficients the best performance of the model is reached for women. In terms of prediction the model proves useful for not coupled persons. Except for the variable named ‘children aged less than six years’, all variables perform well.     

A panel study of labour supply and taxes in Denmark

The labour supply of Danish married couples is estimated on a longitudinal sample of about 3000 Danish couples observed over the period 1980–86. The influence of the progressive tax system and the effect of the unemployment insurance system are evaluated. The definition of unemployment in labour-supply functions is discussed, and two separate models are estimated where unemployment is considered either completely voluntary or completely involuntary. The wage elasticity and the supply effects of tax reduction are estimated to be positive, but numerically small for both men and women.     

Teen families,welfare transfers,and the minimum wage: evidence from Canada

Abstract This study evaluates the impacts of welfare transfers and the minimum wage on teen family formation by pooling provincial data from Canada between 1990 and 2005. OLS estimates suggest that welfare transfers have had limited impact on teen births. On the other hand, a 10% increase in the minimum wage is significantly correlated with a 3%–5% rise in teen birth rates. This finding is explained by further regressions, which reveal that an increase in the minimum wage is significantly associated with (1) higher earnings among male teens, (2) an increase in teen marriage rates, and (3) an increase in fertility among married teens but not among unmarried females. Finally, estimates based on the 2003 and 2005 waves of the Canadian Community Health Surveys demonstrate that married teens are more likely to engage in sex as well as unprotected intercourse in comparison with single teens.     

INTER‐TEMPORAL LABOUR FORCE PARTICIPATION AMONG MARRIED WOMEN IN JAPAN*

This paper investigates the components that affect inter‐temporal labour force participation among married women in Japan. We estimate linear probability models and simple, dynamic probit models with a variety of specifications. We find that serially correlated transitory errors have a significant effect on the participation behaviour of married women, while the first‐order lagged dependent variable has no significant effect. The result that serially correlated transitory errors influence married women's inter‐temporal labour force participation suggests that exogenous rather than endogenous causes have a significant effect on long‐term economic disparity among married women.     

Estimating the factors determining the demand for induced abortions among married women in Taiwan

This paper purports to estimate the characteristics of women who had experiences of abortion in 1991 based on an economic model of fertility. The study makes use of a national survey on the knowledge of, attitude towards, and practice of family planning and reproductive health among married women in Taiwan. The results show that older women with higher family income and who live in urban areas were more likely to have the pregnancy terminated. In addition, the decision to have an abortion was negatively correlated with prior pregnancy loss, but positively associated with the number of previous live births. On the other hand, the availability of abortion services as measured by the number of legal abortion providers at city and county levels had a negative effect on the demand for abortions. The local female unemployment rate was found to be positively correlated with the woman's decision to have an abortion.     

A Cross-Section Analysis of the Labour Force Participation of Married Women in Australia

'In a time when whales and seals are classified as endangered species, babies also seem to be an endangered species ˙˙˙ with so many mothers in the workforce our population growth has dropped below zero and I think the Federal government should counter that trend˙˙˙˙ Babies born in Australia are our best new Australians.' (Senator Florence Bjelke-Petersen in a speech to the Women's Action Alliance, reported in the Canberra Times, 3 June 1981 .)
The paper examines the labour supply of married women in Australia using data from the 1974 Census of Population and Housing. A number of approaches to modeling are employed. In the first instance OLS equations are estimated. These estimates are compared with instrumental variable estimates endogenizing wage rates. and with estimates from a three-equation system endogenizing fertility as well as wages. The evidence suggests that many of the factors proposed by modern theory do exercise significant influences in anticipated directions on the labour supply of married women in Australia.     

Alternative interpretations of hours information in an econometric model of labour supply

This paper examines the labour supply behaviour of married women in France. A sequence of models is specified and estimated which incorporate different amounts of information on observed weekly hours. In all models the distinction is drawn between search and non-participation among non-workers. We provide extensive specification diagnostics, including Heckman-Andrews tests, as well as Hausman tests for the comparison of different handlings of the hours information. It turns out that distinguishing between part-time, full-time and long hours gives virtually the same results as treating observed hours as reflecting desired hours.     

Human capital and the time-profile of human fertility revisited

This paper examines a model of the intertemporal distribution of births recently proposed by Cigno that concludes 1) the optimal time profile will satisfy the Hotelling rule of natural resources depletion, and 2) women with high initial endowments of human capital will have all their children early in married life while those with low initial endowments will spread childbearing more evenly over the fertile period. This paper argues that Cigno's model is inconsistent with the empirical evidence. Specifically, it is claimed that: 1) the natural resource analogy has been misapplied; 2) the stated 1st order conditions are incorrect; 3) optimal birth profiles do not satsify the Hotelling rule; and 4) the optimal time profile is for all women, regardless of their human capital, to concentrate births at the end of the fertile period. Since the discounted opportunity cost of a birth declines over time, it always pays to postpone a birth as long as possible. However, again, the theoretical prediction of delayed childbirth is not consistent with available evidence, suggesting that important factors have been omitted from this model.     

Fertility pattern of Muslim Hausa women in northern Nigeria

This paper reports the results of a fertility survey conducted in 1980 in Malumfashi town in northern Nigeria. The study covered 302 Hausa-speaking households in 2 wards. Of the 302 married males surveyed, 168 were monogamous, 92 had 2 wives, 30 had 3 wives, and 12 and 4 wives (the maximum allowable). All 168 monogramous marriages were not monogamous at the start. The average duration of present marriage among respondents was 14.1 years for monogamous unions and 11.0 years for polygymous unions. The average number of children ever born to women over 45 years of age was 6.3 (6.7 in monogamous unions and 6.0 in polygamous unions). The average family size for all marriages was 3.6, but this value was 4.6 in monogamous unions and 3.4 in polygamous unions (age standardized values were 4.5 and 3.4, respectively). There were 80 live births in the survey sample during the 12 months preceding the study, with a mean age at childbirth of 28.7 years. The crude birth rate for the surveyed population was 48.06/1000 (46/1000 for monogamous families and 43/1000 for polygamous families). The infant mortality rate was 137.5/1000 live births. About 11% of women in the sample were sterile. The fertility rate observed in this study is lower than that in Nigeria as a whole, perhaps because of the prevalence of polygamous unions in this region. These results support the observation that women in polygamous unions have lower fertility than those in monogamous unions.     

Dynamics of female labour force participation in France

This article formulates and estimates a structural intertemporal model of labour force participation. Relying on theoretical characterizations derived from an economic model of lifetime behaviour, we estimate a dynamic probit model with correlated random effects using longitudinal data to allow for a dynamic structure. The model is applied to a panel of married women drawn from the 1997–2002 French Labour Force surveys in order to represent their participation behaviour. It is estimated by maximum simulated likelihood. Our results show that women’s decisions to go out to work are characterized by significant state dependence, unobserved heterogeneity and negative serial correlation in the transitory error component. In addition, we find that the presence of young children in a woman’s household reduces her labour participation, but unequally according to their age and number. As expected, educational level has a positive impact on women’s participation. Last, a rise in the husband’s wage is found to raise female participation initially and to lower it subsequently. This empirical finding suggests that leisure may not systematically be a normal good, contrary to what is frequently assumed in the literature.     

Labor market decisions of married women: With emphasis on part-time employment

Part-time employment may be viewed as a bridge between nonemployment and full-time employment or as an alternative to full-time employment. For married women with young children, part-time employment represents an efficient labor market solution to balancing the responsibilities of career and family. This paper estimates the probability of part-time employment for married women by utilizing a multinomial logit model for data extracted from the Panel Study of Income Dynamics [2000]. The paper focuses on the analysis of qualitative dependent variables to predict the probabilities for three distinct labor market decisions. The sample is further stratified to capture the effects of age on a married woman's labor market decision. A clearer picture of part-time employment should provide important insight into the labor market decisions of married women.     

Marital status and full–time/part–time work status in child care choices

Using recent SIPP data, this study estimates two econometric models to study the differences in the effect of child care costs on employment status and differences in the mode of child care used controlling for employment status. For both married and single women, full–time employment is more elastic with respect to changes in the price of child care than part–time employment and employment elasticities are larger for single than married mothers. In the model of child care modal choice, we find that an increased probability of full–time employment is associated with an increase in the use of centre care for both married and single mothers, and that price elasticities of modal choice are larger for single than married mothers.