The Effect of Paternity Leave on Children’s Earnings

Details

Supervisors

Kuenn, Steffen

Faculty

Faculté des sciences économiques, sociales, politiques et de communication

Degree label

Master [120] en sciences économiques, orientation générale, à finalité spécialisée

Abstract

enGrowing evidence suggests that intergenerationally transmitted gender norms play a major role in hindering gender convergence on the labour market. Building on these findings, my thesis investigates whether paternity leave can influence children's future earnings, potentially by shaping their gender norms. I estimate the intention-to-treat (ITT) effect of paternity leave on children's earnings using a regression discontinuity design (RDD) based on data from the European Union Statistics on Income and Living Conditions (EU-SILC). The identification strategy exploits paternity leave reforms in Norway (1993) and Sweden (1995) as quasi-experiments, comparing individuals whose fathers were eligible for paternity leave to those whose fathers were not. My analysis finds no statistically significant effect of paternity leave eligibility on children’s earnings, for either gender. These findings contradict my initial hypothesis that paternity leave might particularly affect men’s earnings, based on prior evidence that the studied policies altered male children’s gender norms and steered their occupational choices toward more female-dominated fields. A key limitation of my study is the relatively young age of the sample, many of whom are still in education or at the early stages of their careers. This arises from the limited time since the reforms were implemented. Consequently, we cannot yet draw conclusions about the impact of paternity leave on children’s life-cycle earnings. Despite this limitation, my study contributes to the existing literature by providing first empirical evidence of the intergenerational effect of paternity leave on children’s earnings and lays the groundwork for future research.