This website uses cookies.

By clicking the "Accept" button or continuing to browse our site, you agree to first-party and session-only cookies being stored on your device to enhance site navigation and analyze site performance and traffic. For more information on our use of cookies, please see our Privacy Policy.

  1. Home
  2. Journals
  3. American Economic Journal: Economic Policy
  4. August 2013
  5. The Effect of a Universal Child Benefit on Conceptions, Abortions, and Early Maternal Labor Supply

The Effect of a Universal Child Benefit on Conceptions, Abortions, and Early Maternal Labor Supply

  • Libertad González
American Economic Journal: Economic Policy
vol. 5, no. 3, August 2013
(pp. 160-88)
Download Full Text PDF

Abstract

I study the impact of a universal child benefit on fertility and maternal labor supply. I exploit the unanticipated introduction of a sizable child benefit in Spain in 2007. Following a regression discontinuity-type design, I find that the benefit significantly increased fertility, in part through a reduction in abortions. Families who received the benefit did not increase consumption. Instead, eligible mothers stayed out of the labor force longer after childbirth, which led to their children spending less time in formal child care.

Citation

González, Libertad. 2013. "The Effect of a Universal Child Benefit on Conceptions, Abortions, and Early Maternal Labor Supply." American Economic Journal: Economic Policy, 5 (3): 160-88. DOI: 10.1257/pol.5.3.160

Additional Materials

JEL Classification

  • I38 Welfare and Poverty: Government Programs; Provision and Effects of Welfare Programs
  • J13 Fertility; Family Planning; Child Care; Children; Youth
  • J16 Economics of Gender; Non-labor Discrimination
  • J22 Time Allocation and Labor Supply
There are no comments for this article.
Login to Comment