Causal effects of paternity leave on children and parents

Sara Cools (), Jon Fiva and Lars Kirkebøen

Discussion Papers from Statistics Norway, Research Department

Abstract: In this paper we use a parental leave reform directed towards fathers to identify the causal effects of paternity leave on children's and parents' outcomes. We document that paternity leave causes fathers to become more important for children's cognitive skills. School performance at age 16 increases for children whose father is relatively higher educated than the mother. We find no evidence that fathers' earnings and work hours are affected by paternity leave. Contrary to expectation, mothers' labor market outcomes are adversely affected by paternity leave. Our findings do therefore not suggest that paternity leave shifts the gender balance at home in a way that increases mothers' time and/or effort spent at market work.

Keywords: parental leave; labor supply; child development (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: I21 J13 J22 J24 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2011-07
New Economics Papers: this item is included in nep-lab
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Citations: View citations in EconPapers (18)

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Related works:
Journal Article: Causal Effects of Paternity Leave on Children and Parents (2015)
Working Paper: Causal Effects of Paternity Leave on Children and Parents (2011)
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Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:ssb:dispap:657

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