Child sleep and mother labour market outcomes

Joan Costa-Font and Sarah Flèche

Journal of Health Economics, 2020, vol. 69, issue C

Abstract: We show that sleep deprivation exerts strong negative effects on mothers’ labour market performance. To isolate variations in maternal sleep, we exploit unique variations in child sleep disruption using a UK panel dataset that follows mother-child pairs through time. We find that sleeping one hour less per night on average significantly decreases maternal labour force participation, the number of hours worked and household income. We identify one mechanism driving the effects, namely the influence of maternal sleep on selection into full-time versus part-time work. Increased schedule flexibility for mothers with sufficient tenure mitigates the negative effects of sleep deprivation.

Keywords: Child sleep; Sleep; Maternal employment; Working hours; Workplace flexibility; ALSPAC (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: I18 J13 J22 J28 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2020
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (19)

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Working Paper: Child sleep and mother labour market outcomes (2020)
Working Paper: Child sleep and mother labour market outcomes (2020)
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Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:eee:jhecon:v:69:y:2020:i:c:s0167629619301985

DOI: 10.1016/j.jhealeco.2019.102258

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