Do childbirth makes us more conservative?

Does childbearing make us more conservative?
Childbearing and attitudes towards gender norms
Lucas van der Velde
Warsaw School of Economics
FAME| GRAPE
16th European Association for Comparative Economic Studies Conference

Introduction
Motivation
Gender wage gaps are impacted by beliefs on gender roles
(Steinhauer 2018, Charles et al. 2018, Kleven, Landais, Posch, Steinhauer and Zweimüller 2019)
Children penalty plays an important role in explaining GWG
(Polachek 1981, Kleven, Landais and Søgaard 2019, Cukrowska-Torzewska and Matysiak 2020)

Introduction
Motivation
Beliefs are not stable
Evolution of beliefs around childbirth
(Borrell-Porta et al. 2019, Kuziemko et al. 2018, Berrington et al. 2008, Cunningham 2008)
Cognitive dissonance
(Kranton 2016)

Introduction
Motivation
Beliefs are not stable
Evolution of beliefs around childbirth
(Borrell-Porta et al. 2019, Kuziemko et al. 2018, Berrington et al. 2008, Cunningham 2008)
Cognitive dissonance
(Kranton 2016)
Shortcomings of the literature
Focus on a single country (mostly US or UK)
Emphasize changes for a men or women, rarely both

Introduction
How does this paper fit in the literature?
Main hypothesis
Birth as an information shock (Kuziemko et al. 2018)

Introduction
Main hypothesis
Birth as an information shock (Kuziemko et al. 2018)
Childbirth
Unanticipated
difficulties in WLB
Cognitive
dissonance
↑ traditional
attitudes

Introduction
Main hypothesis
Childbirth
Unanticipated
difficulties in WLB
Cognitive
dissonance
↑ traditional
attitudes
The procedure
Estimate the relation between birth of first child and attitudes
Explore heterogeneity across countries

Data and Methods
Gender and generations survey
a.k.a. Gender and generations programme
Effort coordinated by UNECE & the NIDI
Data collected by national administrators
Survey instrument adapted to national circumstances
Survey years: between 2002 & 2014; 2 waves per country, 3-5 years between waves
Country coverage :
Austria, Bulgaria, Czech Republic, France, Georgia, Germany, Hungary, Lithuania, Poland, and
Russia

Data and Methods
Sample description
Study focuses on respondents who
1 Appear in 2 waves
2 Are childless in wave 1
3 Are between 20 and 35 years old in wave 1

Data and Methods
Sample description
1 Appear in 2 waves
How binding are these conditions?
All In wave 2 & in 20-35 & Childless
N 112 784 89 675 18 875 11 468

Data and Methods
Sample description
1 Appear in 2 waves
How binding are these conditions?
All In wave 2 & in 20-35 & Childless
N 112 784 89 675 18 875 11 468
# countries: 10 → Average N per country = 1147 By country

Data and Methods
Agreement with traditional gender norms
I measure agreement in two domains:
Importance of the family
Women in labor market

Data and Methods
1 Women require a child to be fulfilled
2 Men require a child to be fulfilled
3 Pre-school children suffer if their mother works

Data and Methods
1 Women require a child to be fulfilled
3 Pre-school children suffer if their mother works
4 When jobs are scarce, men have more right than women
5 If women earns more than husband, it is not good for the relationship
6 Being a housewife is just as fulfilling as a paid job
7 When jobs are scarce, people with children have more right to work than childless

Data and Methods
1 Women require a child to be fulfilled †
3 Pre-school children suffer if their mother works † ‡ ⋄
4 When jobs are scarce, men have more right than women †
5 If women earns more than husband, it is not good for the relationship
6 Being a housewife is just as fulfilling as a paid job †
7 When jobs are scarce, people with children have more right to work than childless
†
Seguino (2007), Steinhauer (2018), ‡
Berrington et al. (2008), Schober and Scott (2012), Perales et al. (2019), ⋄
Charles et al. (2018)

Data and Methods
Sample description
Are parents and non-parents different?
Wave 1 Wave 2
No-parents Parents Non-parents Parents
Demographics
Female 0.43 0.53 0.43 0.53
Age 25.56 26.72 28.91 30.14
Married 0.06 0.31 0.14 0.67
Education
Primary 0.08 0.08 0.08 0.08
Secondary 0.64 0.59 0.47 0.50
Tertiary 0.28 0.33 0.45 0.42
Labor Market Status
WE or SE 0.60 0.76 0.66 0.69
Family workers 0.01 0.01 0.14 0.17
Unemployed 0.14 0.13 0.11 0.08
Inactive 0.25 0.10 0.10 0.06

Data and Methods
Method: Diff-in-diff estimation + PSM
I estimate LPMs of the form
P(agreesy )i,t = α + β1Parentsi + β2Afteri,t + β3Aftert × Parentsi + γ′
Xi,1 + ϵi,t (1)

Data and Methods
Xi,1 + ϵi,t (1)
where
P(agreesy )i,t → respondent (strongly) agrees with a norm
Parentsi indicates whether i would-be (W1) or is (W2) a parent
Afteri indicates survey wave → after childbirth for parents
Xi,1 other covariates measured at the time of first survey (or FE)
Individual observations are reweighted following Imai and Ratkovic (2013)

Data and Methods
Xi,1 + ϵi,t (1)
where
β3
→ Coefficient of interest
→ Causal effect of childbirth on attitudes
→ β3 > 0 indicates more agreement with norms
→ interpretation as ATET

Results
Diff-in-diff results
Xi,1 + ϵi,t

Results
Diff-in-diff results
Xi,1 + ϵi,t
Importance of the family Women in labor market

Results
Diff-in-diff results: Women and family life
Summary
Women (appear to) priorize family over career → Outcome (1) , (2)
Children also gains importance for men → Outcome (2)
Men appear to embrace more traditional gender roles
→ Outcome (3)
→ ‘Mighty’ girl effect ? (Borrell-Porta et al. 2019)

Results
Diff-in-diff results: Women and work realm
Summary
No evidence on men changing their attitude in gender norms (Outcomes 4-7)
Women appear to become more conservative in
→ Access to jobs (4)
→ But not in earnings nor household chores
Parents have a ‘corporativist’ view of employment
→ Similar effects across genders
→ What do they tell about gender inequality?

Results
Diff-in-diff results: heterogeneity analysis
Xi,1 + ϵi,t

Results
Summary
In CEE countries more marked change in opinions
Effects vary by country, very large in Lithuania, smaller in Poland.
Estimates are not precisely estimated (N < 1000 in most cases)
Non-CEE countries are not monolithic

Results
Summary
where ↑ sex-differentiation →↑ support for traditional norms

Results
Summary
where ↑ sex-differentiation →↑ support for traditional norms
Coefficients are larger and more significants
where institutionalized care is lower
where women have a larger share of household responsibilities

Results
Robustness checks
Do children change other attitudes?
Do any other transitions bring similar effects?
Skip

Results
Robustness checks
No effects founds for:
Attitudes towards same-sex couples
Cohabiting couples
Men are better political leaders than women
It is ok for couples to divorce
Skip

Results
Robustness checks
Respondents also changed marital status and education level
No evidence of change in attitudes towards traditional gender norms
Skip

Concluding remarks
Concluding remarks
Results expand literature on child gap by looking at how other outcomes are affected
Attitudes towards traditional gender norms change after childbirth
→ agreement that children are required to be fulfilled
→ agreement that children suffer if mother works (men)
→ Men priority if jobs are scarce (women)
Evidence of cross-country heterogeneity in these answers
→ agreement stronger in CEE
→ agreement stronger if lack of formal care / help
Attitudes unrelated to household chores and labor participation do not change

Concluding remarks
Last slide
Thank you for your attention
w: grape.org.pl
t: grape org
f: grape.org
e: lvandervelde@grape.org.pl

References
Berrington, A., Hu, Y., Smith, P. W. F. and Sturgis, P.: 2008, A graphical chain model for reciprocal
relationships between women’s gender role attitudes and labour force participation, Journal of the Royal
Statistical Society: Series A (Statistics in Society) 171(1), 89–108.
Borrell-Porta, M., Costa-Font, J. and Philipp, J.: 2019, The ‘mighty girl’ effect: does parenting daughters alter
attitudes towards gender norms?, Oxford Economic Papers 71(1), 25–46.
Charles, K. K., Guryan, J. and Pan, J.: 2018, The effects of sexism on american women: The role of norms vs.
discrimination, Technical report.
Cukrowska-Torzewska, E. and Matysiak, A.: 2020, The motherhood wage penalty: A meta-analysis, Social
Science Research 88-89, 102416.
Cunningham, M.: 2008, Changing Attitudes toward the Male Breadwinner, Female Homemaker Family Model:
Influences of Women’s Employment and Education over the Lifecourse, Social Forces 87(1), 299–323.
Imai, K. and Ratkovic, M.: 2013, Covariate balancing propensity score, Journal of the Royal Statistical Society:
Series B (Statistical Methodology) 76(1), 243–263.
Kleven, H., Landais, C., Posch, J., Steinhauer, A. and Zweimüller, J.: 2019, Child penalties across countries:
Evidence and explanations, Working Paper 25524, National Bureau of Economic Research.
Kleven, H., Landais, C. and Søgaard, J. E.: 2019, Children and gender inequality: Evidence from denmark,
American Economic Journal: Applied Economics 11(4), 181–209.
Kranton, R. E.: 2016, Identity economics 2016: Where do social distinctions and norms come from?, American
Economic Review 106(5), 405–09.
Kuziemko, I., Pan, J., Shen, J. and Washington, E.: 2018, The mommy effect: Do women anticipate the
employment effects of motherhood?, Technical report.

Appendix
Perales, F., Lersch, P. M. and Baxter, J.: 2019, Birth cohort, ageing and gender ideology: Lessons from British
panel data, Social Science Research 79, 85–100.
Polachek, S.: 1981, Occupational self-selection: A human capital approach to sex differences in occupational
structure, The Review of Economics and Statistics 63(1), 60–69.
Schober, P. and Scott, J.: 2012, Maternal employment and gender role attitudes: dissonance among british men
and women in the transition to parenthood, Work, Employment and Society 26(3), 514–530.
Seguino, S.: 2007, PlusÇa change? evidence on global trends in gender norms and stereotypes, Feminist
Economics 13(2), 1–28.
Steinhauer, A.: 2018, Working Moms, Childlessness, and Female Identity, CEPR Discussion Papers 12929,
C.E.P.R. Discussion Papers.

Appendix
Sample selection by country
Country All In wave 2 & in 20’s & Childless
Austria 5000 3918 1468 1042
Bulgaria 12858 9363 2316 1255
Czechia 10006 9723 2211 1507
France 10079 8643 1562 1097
Georgia 10000 9845 2136 1216
Germany 10017 3977 556 370
Hungary 13540 10641 2510 1653
Lithuania 10036 9877 2003 1236
Poland 19987 12952 1949 1091
Russia 11261 10736 2164 1001
Total 112784 89675 18875 11468
Back

Do childbirth makes us more conservative?

Recommended

Recommended

More Related Content

Similar to Do childbirth makes us more conservative?

Similar to Do childbirth makes us more conservative? (20)

More from GRAPE

More from GRAPE (20)

Recently uploaded

Recently uploaded (20)

Do childbirth makes us more conservative?