This website uses cookies.

By clicking the "Accept" button or continuing to browse our site, you agree to first-party and session-only cookies being stored on your device to enhance site navigation and analyze site performance and traffic. For more information on our use of cookies, please see our Privacy Policy.

« Back to Results

Social Norms, Female Labor Supply and the Family

Paper Session

Friday, Jan. 4, 2019 10:15 AM - 12:15 PM

Atlanta Marriott Marquis, A706
Hosted By: American Economic Association
  • Chair: Justin Wolfers, University of Michigan

Like Mother, Like Daughter? Societal Determinants of Maternal Labour Supply – Evidence from the German Reunification

Anna Raute
,
Queen Mary University of London
Uta Schönberg
,
University College London
Barbara Boelmann
,
University College London

Abstract

Does the culture a woman grows up in influence her return-to-work decisions after childbirth? And to what extent can the culture of the current social environment shape maternal labor supply? To address these questions, we exploit the unique setting of the German reunification. As a state socialist country, East Germany strongly encouraged mothers to participate in the labor market full-time, whereas West Germany propagated a more conservative male breadwinner-model. After reunification, these two cultures clashed. Comparing East and West German mothers at both sides of the inner German border, within the same integrated local labor market, we first show that East German mothers still return to work faster and at a higher rate and work longer hours than West German mothers. Exploiting migration across the former inner-German border and comparing mothers within the same firm we investigate whether women adjust to the culture they migrate to: Whereas West German mothers, who were raised in a more conservative background culture, speed up their return behavior when immersed to the more egalitarian East German culture, East German mothers appear hardly affected by exposure to the more conservative West German culture. Together, our findings highlight that although gender norms appear to be persistent, a mother’s labor supply decisions can be affected by exposure to a more liberal culture in adulthood.

Economic Incentives, Home Production and Gender Norms

Andrea Ichino
,
European University Institute
Martin Olsson
,
Research Institute of Industrial Economics (IFN)
Barbara Petrongolo
,
Queen Mary University of London and CEP (LSE)
Peter Skogma-Thoursie
,
University of Stockholm

Abstract

Gender identity norms have attracted increasing attention as possible drivers of persistent gender gaps, although the extent to which they effectively restrict the behavior of couples is still debated. The baseline allocation of home production between spouses may not be fully informative of gender norms, as it typically results from the combination of both couples' preferences/norms and economic incentives. A direct test for the role of gender norms requires to measure how the time allocation of spouses is affected when the relative wage changes. We argue that the elasticity of substitution between spousal inputs in home production is related to the strength of gender norms governing gender roles, and asymmetric reactions to relative wage shocks reveal which type of norm (Traditional or Untraditional) would be binding. By combining administrative information on home production in Sweden with the introduction in 2007 of a EITC that altered the relative post-tax wages of spouses, we find suggestive evidence of the relevance of both Traditional and Untraditional norms in different groups of the Swedish population.

Misperceived Social Norms: Female Labor Force Participation in Saudi Arabia

Leonardo Bursztyn
,
University of Chicago and NBER
Alessandra L. Gonzalez
,
University of Chicago
David Yanagizawa-Drott
,
University of Zurich

Abstract

We study perceptions of gender norms in the labor market investigating whether they matter for labor supply. We provide incentivized evidence (both from an experimental sample in Riyadh and from a national sample) that the vast majority of married men in Saudi Arabia privately support female labor force participation (FLFP) outside of home from a normative perspective, while they substantially underestimate the level of support for FLFP by other men - even men from their same social setting, such as their neighbors. We then show that randomly correcting these beliefs about others increases married men's willingness to let their wives join the labor force (as measured by their costly signup for a mobile job-matching application for their wives). Finally, we find that this decision maps into real outcomes: four months after the main intervention, the wives of men in our original sample whose beliefs about acceptability of FLFP were corrected are more likely to have applied and interviewed for a job outside of home. Together, our evidence indicates a potentially important source of labor market frictions, where job search is underprovided due to misperceived social norms.

Social Norms, Labor Market Opportunities, and the Marriage Gap for Skilled Women

Marianne Bertrand
,
University of Chicago
Patricia Cortes
,
Boston University
Claudia Olivetti
,
Boston College
Jessica Pan
,
National University of Singapore

Abstract

In most of the developed world, skilled women marry at a lower rate than unskilled women. We document heterogeneity across countries in how the marriage gap for skilled women has evolved over time. As labor market opportunities for women have improved, the marriage gap has been growing in some countries but shrinking in others. We discuss the comparative statics of a theoretical model in which the (negative) social attitudes toward working women might contribute to the lower marriage rate of skilled women, and might also induce a non-monotonic relationship between their labor market prospects and their marriage outcomes. The model delivers predictions about how the marriage gap for skilled women should react to changes in their labor market opportunities across economies with more or less conservative attitudes toward working women. We verify the key predictions of this model in a panel of 26 developed countries, as well as in a panel of US states.
Discussant(s)
Heather Sarsons
,
Harvard University
Marianne Bertrand
,
University of Chicago
Melanie Wassermann
,
University of California-Los Angeles
Justin Wolfers
,
University of Michigan
JEL Classifications
  • J1 - Demographic Economics
  • J2 - Demand and Supply of Labor