Can Parents' Right to Work Part-Time Hurt Childbearing-Aged Women? A Natural Experiment with Administrative Data

Arbeitspapier

Using a differences-in-differences approach and controlling for individual unobserved heterogeneity, we evaluate the impact of a 1999 law that granted all workers with children younger than 7 years old protection against a layoff if the worker had previously asked for a work-week reduction due to family responsibilities. As only mothers took advantage of these arrangements, we find that after the law, employers were: (i) more likely to let childbearing-aged working women go relative to their male counterparts; (ii) less likely to promote childbearing-aged women into good jobs; and (iii) less likely to hire childbearing-aged women. In addition, employers were able to pass at least part of the cost to childbearing-aged women through lower wages, and the amount passed to workers increased with the precariousness of the job. Heterogeneity analysis reveals that the effect on employment transitions is mainly driven by low-skilled workers and those in blue-collar jobs, while the effect on wages holds across all groups. Evidence that the substitution away from (good) jobs widens over time suggests employer learning. These results are robust to the use of different specifications and placebo tests.

Object Details

• Language: Englisch

References and Relationships

• Bibliographic citation: Series: IZA Discussion Papers ; No. 7509

Classification and Topics

• Classification: Wirtschaft ; Single Equation Models; Single Variables: Panel Data Models; Spatio-temporal Models ; Single Equation Models; Single Variables: Discrete Regression and Qualitative Choice Models; Discrete Regressors; Proportions; Probabilities ; Multiple or Simultaneous Equation Models: Panel Data Models; Spatio-temporal Models ; Economics of Gender; Non-labor Discrimination ; Time Allocation and Labor Supply ; Job, Occupational, and Intergenerational Mobility; Promotion
• Subject: female employment transitions and wages ; fixed-term and permanent contract

Contributors, Places and Time

• Event: Geistige Schöpfung
• (who): Fernández-Kranz, Daniel ; Rodríguez-Planas, Núria
• Event: Veröffentlichung
• (who): Institute for the Study of Labor (IZA)
• (where): Bonn
• (when): 2013

Further information

• Handle: http://hdl.handle.net/10419/80530
• Last update: 10.03.2025, 11:44 AM CET