出版社：Suntory Toyota International Centres for Economics and Related Disciplines
摘要：This paper uses microdata from the United States, Britain, and Japan to examine the effects of family leave coverage on women's employment after childbirth. Our three sample countries provide a range of family leave policy regimes. The United States had no national family leave legislation prior to the passage of the Family and Medical Leave Act in 1993, but many women were covered by employer policies as a result of other federal legislation, state leave legislation, union contracts, or voluntary initiatives. Britain passed national maternity leave legislation in 1978, but, until the reforms of 1993, only about half of working women were eligible for coverage. In Japan, maternity leave was introduced as part of the national labour standards in 1947 but not all workers are covered; child care leave was introduced in 1991 and implemented incrementally over the next several years. We use labour force survey data to examine the employment rates and employment decisions of women with young children in each of our three countries. Our results confirm that young children continue to have a very strong negative effect on women’s employment; this effect is most pronounced in Britain. We then take advantage of panel data to investigate the effects of family leave coverage on women's job retention after childbirth. We find that family leave coverage increases the likelihood that a woman will return to her employer after childbirth in all three countries, with a particularly marked effect in Japan. This result suggests that the recent expansions in family leave coverage in the sample countries are likely to lead to increased employment of women after childbirth.
