Behind the Child Penalty: Understanding What Contributes to the Labour Market Costs of Motherhood

Alessandra Casarico and Salvatore Lattanzio

No 9155, CESifo Working Paper Series from CESifo

Abstract: We study the short- and long-run impact of motherhood on labour market outcomes and explore the individual and firm-level factors that influence it. Using matched employer-employee data for Italy over 1985-2018, through an event study methodology around childbirth, we show that the long-run child penalty in annual earnings is 57 log points and it largely depends on the change in labour supply along the intensive margin. The birth of a child increases the probability of transition to non-employment, reduces the likelihood of having executive roles and increases that of working in firms with lower productivity, sales, capital and wages, providing evidence of sorting into worse firms after childbirth. In the heterogeneity analysis, we find that the child penalty is higher for young, low-wage mothers and those taking longer leaves. It is larger in firms with less generous pay, worse peers, in more gender-conservative regions and where childcare services are scarcer.

Keywords: child penalty; motherhood; labour-supply; heterogeneous effects; matched employer-employee data (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: J13 J16 J31 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2021
New Economics Papers: this item is included in nep-dem, nep-eur, nep-gen and nep-lab
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (9)

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Journal Article: Behind the child penalty: understanding what contributes to the labour market costs of motherhood (2023)
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Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:ces:ceswps:_9155

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