Please use this identifier to cite or link to this item: https://hdl.handle.net/10419/245403 
Year of Publication: 
2021
Series/Report no.: 
CESifo Working Paper No. 9222
Publisher: 
Center for Economic Studies and ifo Institute (CESifo), Munich
Abstract: 
Does employment during motherhood change peoples preferences? We study whether the experience of employment during motherhood exerts an effect on attitudes towards gender norms, and more specifically, attitudes towards the impact of women's employment on children's wellbeing (which proxy traditional gender attitudes). Drawing on a large, representative and longitudinal data and an instrumental variable (IV) strategy that exploits a Bartik instrument for employment, we find that, that non-mothers who work and mothers who do not work are more likely to agree that pre-school children suffer if mothers work, which we proxy as having more traditional views. However, this is not the case when women experience both working and motherhood it does not significantly change women's attitudes. These results suggest that exogenous changes in employment during motherhood confirm individuals priors, and point towards the critical role of early life value formation. That is, employment during motherhood is not a "value changing experience" but rather a "value preserving experience". Hence, the so-called 'motherhood penalty' cannot be fully explained by a change in attitudes after employment during motherhood.
Subjects: 
attitude formation
value changing experiences
confirmation bias
women employment attitudes
women employment after maternity
later life attitudes
children
JEL: 
Z10
J22
Document Type: 
Working Paper
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