Family, labour and fertility

What do women want in a job? Gender-biased preferences and the reservation wage gap

Kenza Elass

Key points:

This paper uses French administrative data from the French Unemployment Services providing information on job search behaviour to assess which kind of occupations men and women apply for and the gap in their reservation wages.
There are widespread gender differences in the occupation characteristics targeted by job seekers, both in terms of content and amenities of the desired occupation.
Using a change in childcare benefits for single parents in a causal analysis, results show that a change in household constraints changes the job search behaviour of women.

Kenza Elass

Published in Labour Economics (2024)

Who cares about childcare? Evidence from the Covid-19 pandemic

Paola Profeta with A. Marchese and G. Savio

Key points:

Compares public expenditures in Italian municipalities below 500 inhabitants run by a male and a female mayor
Using close races gender mixed elections it shows that before the Covid-19 pandemic female mayors were spending more in childcare than male mayors
However, during and after the pandemic this difference disappears, as men increase their spending in childcare

Family culture and childcare: Individual Preferences and Politicians’ Legislative Behavior

Paola Profeta with F. Carta and L. de Masi

Key points:

Studies the role of family organization in shaping public provision of childcare
US citizens with origins in countries characterized by egalitarian inheritance rules prefer a large childcare system, while those coming from large and cohabiting families rely less on the government and as a provider for external childcare
Representatives of US districts where these backgrounds are dominant are respectively more and less prone to vote for childcare interventions, independently of their own background