Publications
Taxing Families: The Impact of Child-related Transfers on Maternal Labor Supply (CRC DP 067/2019)
Conditionally accepted at American Economic Journal: Macroeconomics
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The employment rate of married women with and without pre-school children varies substantially across countries. To what extent can child-related transfers account for this variation? I develop a life-cycle model in which married couples jointly decide their labor supply, female human capital evolves endogenously, and some couples have access to grandparental childcare. I show that child-related transfers can explain most of the variation in the employment rates of married women, even after taking the labor income tax treatment and cross-country variation in childcare fees into account.
Family Institutions and the Global Fertility Transition (PDF, CEPR DP 20827)
joint with Paula Gobbi and Pauline Rossi
In Preparation for: Journal of Economic Perspectives
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Much of the observed cross-country variation in fertility aligns with the predictions of classic theories of the fertility transition: countries with higher levels of human capital, higher GDP per capita, or lower mortality rates tend to exhibit lower fertility. However, when examining changes within countries over the past 60 years, larger fertility declines are only weakly associated with greater improvements in human capital, per capita GDP, or survival rates. To understand why, we focus on the role of family institutions, particularly marriage and inheritance customs. We argue that, together with the diffusion of cultural norms, they help explain variations in the timing, speed and magnitude of the fertility decline. We propose a stylized model integrating economic, health, institutional and cultural factors to study how these factors interact to shape fertility transition paths. We find that family institutions can mediate the effect of economic development by constraining fertility responses.
The Economics of Fertility: A New Era (PDF, Data for Figures)
joint with Matthias Doepke, Fabian Kindermann and Michèle Tertilt
In: Handbook of Family Economics Vol. 1, Editors: Shelly Lundberg and Alessandra Voena, (Amsterdam: Elsevier)
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In this survey, we argue that the economic analysis of fertility has entered a new era. First-generation models of fertility choice were designed to account for two empirical regularities that, in the past, held both across countries and across families in a given country: a negative relationship between income and fertility, and another negative relationship between women’s labor force participation and fertility. The economics of fertility has entered a new era because these stylized facts no longer universally hold. In high-income countries, the income-fertility relationship has flattened and in some cases reversed, and the cross-country relationship between women’s labor force participation and fertility is now positive. We summarize these new facts and describe new models that are designed to address them. The common theme of these new theories is that they view factors that determine the compatibility of women’s career and family goals as key drivers of fertility. We highlight four factors that facilitate combining a career with a family: family policy, cooperative fathers, favorable social norms, and flexible labor markets. We also review other recent developments in the literature, and we point out promising new directions for future research on the economics of fertility.
Non-technical summaries: Vox.eu, IMF F&D Magazine
Featured in: Economist, Economist (2), BBC Brasil, El Confidencial
The Economics of Women's Rights (PDF, Replication Package)
joint with Michèle Tertilt, Matthias Doepke and Laura Montenbruck
Journal of the European Economic Association, Vol. 20(6), 2271-2316, December 2022.
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Two centuries ago, in most countries around the world, women were unable to vote, had no say over their own children or property, and could not obtain a divorce. Women have gradually gained rights in many areas of life, and this legal expansion has been closely intertwined with economic development. We aim to understand the drivers behind these reforms. To this end, we distinguish between four types of women’s rights - economic, political, labor, and body - and document their evolution over the past 50 years across countries. We summarize the political-economy mechanisms that link economic development to changes in women's rights and show empirically that these mechanisms account for a large share of the variation in women's rights across nations and over time.
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Non-technical summary: Vox.eu
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Working Papers
Cohabitation, Child Development, and College Costs (PDF, CEPR DP 20802), under review
joint with Efi Adamopoulou, Karen Kopecky, and Tim Obermeier
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US college-educated couples with children marry at higher rates than those without a college degree. We argue that marriage, which entails lower separation risk and more equitable asset division if separation occurs, provides insurance to the lower-earning spouse, facilitating child investment. Investing in children is more valuable for college-educated couples, who are more likely to send their children to college. Using an OLG model of marriage, cohabitation, wealth accumulation, and educational investments where college is costly and completion is risky, we find that high college costs reduce incentives to marry among couples without a college degree. These differences in union choice by education heighten differences in children’s
educational attainment and reduce intergenerational mobility.
Luxuries, Necessities, and the Allocation of Time (PDF, CEPR DP 19945), R&R at International Economic Review
joint with Lei Fang and Pedro Silos
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In this paper, we study consumption and welfare inequality by analyzing how households allocate resources—market expenditures and the value of time—to the production of activities. The share of resources allocated to an activity rises or falls with wages, classifying them into luxuries or necessities, respectively. An estimated model with non-homothetic preferences shows that the rise in consumption inequality between 2004 and 2019 was mostly due to an increase in wage dispersion, while rising prices, especially of leisure luxuries, had a significant negative effect on inequality. The distinction between luxuries and necessities amplifies the counteracting effects of wage and price on inequality.
The Political Economy of Laws to "Protect" Women (PDF, submitted)
joint with Matthias Doepke, Hanno Foerster and Michèle Tertilt
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During the first half of the twentieth century, many US states enacted laws restricting women’s labor market opportunities, including maximum hours restrictions, minimum wage laws, and night-shift bans. The era of so-called protective labor laws came to an end in the 1960s as a result of civil rights reforms. In this paper, we investigate the political economy behind the rise and fall of these laws. We argue that the main driver behind protective labor laws was men’s desire to shield themselves from labor market competition. We spell out the mechanism through a politico-economic model in which singles and couples work in different sectors and vote on protective legislation. Restrictions are supported by single men and couples with male sole earners who compete with women for jobs. We show that the theory’s predictions for when protective legislation will be introduced are well supported by US state-level evidence.​
Bundling Time and Goods: Implications for the Dispersion in Hours Worked (PDF)
joint with Lei Fang and Pedro Silos
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We document that the dispersion in hours worked is large in the cross-section. We study the quantitative effect of wage dispersion on hours dispersion using a model in which households combine their time and market goods to produce consumption activities. We estimate several models with different numbers of activities on the paired expenditures and time use data by consumption activity. The estimated model can account for 25%-87% of the dispersion in hours worked over 2003-2018 with the model incorporating more activities generating more dispersion. The substitutability between goods and time within an activity and across activities is key to the result.
Work in Progress
Why Are Boys Falling Behind? A Historical Perspective on Gender Gaps in School Achievement
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Divorce Law and Female Labor Supply
(joint with Nicola Fuchs-Schündeln and Fabian Kindermann)
The Missing Demographic Dividend
(joint with Paula Gobbi)
Patents and Economic Growth