Child sleep and mother labour market outcomes

Costa-Font, Joan ORCID: 0000-0001-7174-7919 and Fleche, Sarah ORCID: 0000-0001-8927-075X (2020) Child sleep and mother labour market outcomes. Journal of Health Economics, 69. ISSN 0167-6296

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Abstract

We show that sleep deprivation exerts strong negative effects on mothers’ labour market performance. To isolate variations in maternal sleep, we exploit unique variations in child sleep disruption using a UK panel dataset that follows mother-child pairs through time. We find that sleeping one hour less per night on average significantly decreases maternal labour force participation, the number of hours worked and household income. We identify one mechanism driving the effects, namely the influence of maternal sleep on selection into full-time versus part-time work. Increased schedule flexibility for mothers with sufficient tenure mitigates the negative effects of sleep deprivation.

Item Type:	Article
Official URL:	https://www.journals.elsevier.com/journal-of-healt...
Additional Information:	© 2019 Elsevier B.V.
Divisions:	Health Policy Centre for Economic Performance
Subjects:	H Social Sciences > HQ The family. Marriage. Woman H Social Sciences > HD Industries. Land use. Labor H Social Sciences > HC Economic History and Conditions
JEL classification:	J - Labor and Demographic Economics > J1 - Demographic Economics > J13 - Fertility; Family Planning; Child Care; Children; Youth J - Labor and Demographic Economics > J2 - Time Allocation, Work Behavior, and Employment Determination and Creation; Human Capital; Retirement > J22 - Time Allocation and Labor Supply I - Health, Education, and Welfare > I1 - Health > I18 - Government Policy; Regulation; Public Health J - Labor and Demographic Economics > J2 - Time Allocation, Work Behavior, and Employment Determination and Creation; Human Capital; Retirement > J28 - Safety; Accidents; Industrial Health; Job Satisfaction; Related Public Policy
Date Deposited:	15 Nov 2019 09:51
Last Modified:	01 Nov 2024 04:27
URI:	http://eprints.lse.ac.uk/id/eprint/102543

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