A Natural Experiment on Job Insecurity and Fertility in France

Job insecurity can have wide-ranging consequences outside of the labor market. A 1999 rise in the French layoff tax paid by large private firms when they laid off older workers made younger workers less secure; this insecurity reduced their fertility by 3.7 percentage points (with a 95% confidence i...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:IDEAS Working Paper Series from RePEc 2022-03, Vol.104 (2), p.386-398
Main Authors: Clark, Andrew E, Lepinteur, Anthony
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
Economics and Finance
Family size
Fertility
Humanities and Social Sciences
Job insecurity
Job losses
Labor force
Labor market
Older people
Parents & parenting
Workers
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Summary:Job insecurity can have wide-ranging consequences outside of the labor market. A 1999 rise in the French layoff tax paid by large private firms when they laid off older workers made younger workers less secure; this insecurity reduced their fertility by 3.7 percentage points (with a 95% confidence interval between 0.7 and 6.6 percentage points). Reduced fertility is found only at the intensive margin: job insecurity reduces family size but not the probability of parenthood itself. Our results also suggest negative selection into parenthood, as this fertility effect does not appear for low-income and less-educated workers.
ISSN:0034-6535
1530-9142
DOI:10.1162/rest_a_00964