Human Capital, Female Employment, and Electricity: Evidence from the Early 20th Century United States

Daniela Vidart

No 2021-08, Working papers from University of Connecticut, Department of Economics

Abstract: This paper revisits the link between electrification and the rise in female labor force participation (LFP), and presents theoretical and empirical evidence showing that elec-trification triggered a rise in female LFP by increasing market opportunities for skilled women. I formalize my theory in an overlapping generations model and find that my mechanism explains one quarter of the rise in female LFP during the rollout of elec-tricity in the United States (1880–1940), and matches the slow decline in female home-production hours during this period. I then present micro-evidence supporting my theory using newly digitized data on the early electrification of the United States.

Keywords: Female Labor Force Participation; Human Capital Accumulation; Electrification; Skill-biased Technical Change; Home to Market Transition; Brain vs. Brawn (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: E24 J22 J24 O11 O33 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Pages: 108 pages
Date: 2021-05, Revised 2022-09
New Economics Papers: this item is included in nep-dge, nep-his, nep-lma and nep-mac
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (6)

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https://media.economics.uconn.edu/working/2021-08.pdf Full text (application/pdf)

Related works:
Journal Article: Human Capital, Female Employment, and Electricity: Evidence from the Early 20th-Century United States (2024)
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Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:uct:uconnp:2021-08

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