Employment Protection and Parental Child Care

Martin Olsson

No 952, Working Paper Series from Research Institute of Industrial Economics

Abstract: I examine if employment protection affects parental childcare. I find that a softer employment protection has a substantial effect on how parents use and divide paid childcare between them. The identification relies on a reform that made it easier for employers in Sweden to dismiss workers in small firms. I estimate that a softer employment protection reduces the total days of parental childcare in targeted firms, measured as total days of parental leave or temporary parental leave. Both a sorting effect and a behavioral effect can explain the reduced childcare. I also find evidence of a redistribution effect of paid parental childcare within households if only one partner was affected by the reform. I interpret the redistribution effect as a way of evading an external cost on the child.

Keywords: Employment protection; Parental childcare; Within family distribution (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: J13 K13 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Pages: 35 pages
Date: 2013-02-06
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (2)

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Related works:
Working Paper: Employment protection and parental child care (2013)
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