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Delayed First Birth and New Mothers' Labor Market Outcomes: Evidence from Biological Fertility Shocks

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  • Bratti, Massimiliano

    (Università degli Studi di Milano)

  • Cavalli, Laura

    (University of Verona)

Abstract

We investigate the impact of delaying the first birth on Italian mothers' labor market outcomes around childbirth. The effect of postponing motherhood is identified using biological fertility shocks, namely the occurrence of miscarriages and stillbirths. Focusing on mothers' behavior around first birth our study is able to isolate the effect of motherhood postponement from that of total fertility. Our estimates suggest that delaying the first birth by one year raises the likelihood of participating in the labor market by 1.2 percentage points and weekly working time by about half an hour, while we do not find any evidence that late motherhood prevents a worsening of new mothers' job conditions (the so-called "mommy track"). Our findings are robust to a number of sensitivity checks, among which including controls for partners' characteristics and a proxy for maternal health status.

Suggested Citation

  • Bratti, Massimiliano & Cavalli, Laura, 2013. "Delayed First Birth and New Mothers' Labor Market Outcomes: Evidence from Biological Fertility Shocks," IZA Discussion Papers 7135, Institute of Labor Economics (IZA).
    • Handle: RePEc:iza:izadps:dp7135
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    6. Matteo Picchio & Claudia Pigini & Stefano Staffolani & Alina Verashchagina, 2021. "If not now, when? The timing of childbirth and labor market outcomes," Journal of Applied Econometrics, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 36(6), pages 663-685, September.
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    8. Massimiliano Bratti & Simona Fiore & Mariapia Mendola, 2020. "The impact of family size and sibling structure on the great Mexico–USA migration," Journal of Population Economics, Springer;European Society for Population Economics, vol. 33(2), pages 483-529, April.
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    10. Massimiliano Bratti, 2023. "Fertility postponement and labor market outcomes," IZA World of Labor, Institute of Labor Economics (IZA), pages 117-117, January.
    11. Sarah Bögl & Jasmin Moshfegh & Petra Persson & Maria Polyakova, 2024. "The Economics of Infertility: Evidence from Reproductive Medicine," NBER Working Papers 32445, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    12. Insu Chang & Heeran Park & Hosung Sohn, 2021. "Causal Impact of School Starting Age on the Tempo of Childbirths: Evidence from Working Mothers and School Entry Cutoff Using Exact Date of Birth," European Journal of Population, Springer;European Association for Population Studies, vol. 37(4), pages 997-1022, November.
    13. Demir, Firat & Ghosh, Pallab & Liu, Zexuan, 2020. "Effects of motherhood timing, breastmilk substitutes and education on the duration of breastfeeding: Evidence from Egypt," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 133(C).
    14. Voit, Falk A. C., 2023. "Adverse birth outcomes and parental labor market participation after birth," Hannover Economic Papers (HEP) dp-710, Leibniz Universität Hannover, Wirtschaftswissenschaftliche Fakultät.
    15. Markussen, Simen & Strøm, Marte, 2015. "The Effects of Motherhood," Memorandum 19/2015, Oslo University, Department of Economics.
    16. Steinhauer, Andreas & Bíró, Anikó & Dieterle, Steven, 2019. "Motherhood Timing and the Child Penalty: Bounding the Returns to Delay," CEPR Discussion Papers 13732, C.E.P.R. Discussion Papers.
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    18. Tom Kleinepier & Helga de Valk, 2016. "Ethnic differences in family trajectories of young adult women in the Netherlands: Timing and sequencing of events," Demographic Research, Max Planck Institute for Demographic Research, Rostock, Germany, vol. 35(24), pages 671-710.

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    More about this item

    Keywords

    Italy; labor market; fertility shocks; delayed first birth; new mothers;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • J13 - Labor and Demographic Economics - - Demographic Economics - - - Fertility; Family Planning; Child Care; Children; Youth
    • J22 - Labor and Demographic Economics - - Demand and Supply of Labor - - - Time Allocation and Labor Supply

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