Universal Childcare for the Youngest and the Maternal Labour Supply

Astrid Kunze and Xingfei Liu

No 2019-1, Working Papers from University of Alberta, Department of Economics

Abstract: This paper explores whether the expansion of childcare leads to an increase in the maternal labour supply. Exploiting a large nationwide reform that expanded childcare for 1–2-year-olds to 80 percent coverage, we find a significant increase in employment of mothers with young children, but only weak evidence of an increase in contracted hours of work. The adjustments are short-term effects of the reform. We also find substantial heterogeneity. The effects are relatively large for mothers post maternity leave, noteworthy on actual working hours. For mothers with more than one child, effects are strong in the long-term of the reform.

Keywords: childcare; female labour supply; contracted hours; actual hours; causal effects (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: J08 J13 J22 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Pages: 47 pages
Date: 2019-02-01
New Economics Papers: this item is included in nep-dem, nep-eur and nep-lab
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Citations: View citations in EconPapers (6)

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Related works:
Working Paper: Universal Childcare for the Youngest and the Maternal Labour Supply (2019)
Working Paper: Universal Childcare for the Youngest and the Maternal Labour Supply (2019)
Working Paper: Universal Childcare for the Youngest and the Maternal Labour Supply (2019)
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Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:ris:albaec:2019_001

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