The imperatives of marriage, motherhood and employment: Evidence from a Life History Calendar

Marriage and motherhood are almost universal and among the most critical events in a women’s life in developing countries. The impact of childbirth on labour market participation of women has been discussed extensively in the context of developed countries, but impact of marriage and in a developing country context are limited due to lack of longitudinal data. In this paper, using a Life History Calendar approach, we collect retrospective information on major events (marriage, childbirth, labour market transitions) and the concurrent employment status of men and women over their adult lives. Using an event study model, we estimate the impact of marriage and first childbirth on women’s labour market participation. Our main findings are twofold. First, there is a sharp and sustained jump in women’s labor supply after marriage. Second, women do not experience any penalty in their labour market participation after childbirth. These findings are robust to inclusion of additional controls and various other robustness tests. We find that the increase in women’s labor supply post marriage is driven by agricultural informal work. It is concentrated among women who get married at younger ages, are less educated and belong to poorer house holds. Our results might seem surprising and counter‐intuitive at first, but the Indian context helps understand them better. The predominantly informal nature of the Indian economy implies there is ease of entry into (and exit from) employment. This allows for women to enter or remain in workforce on marriage and childbirth. In addition, the norms surrounding mobility and employment are more conservative for unmarried women compared to married women making outside employment more acceptable for the latter. Early age of marriage (half before 18) and the need to earn to support marital family may also explain our findings. Our work underscores the importance of context when considering women’s work. Household responsibilities after marriage and childbirth may not be binding constraints as is often believed, especially in the context of low income,