Are Men’s Attitudes Holding Back Fertility and Women’s Careers? Evidence from Europe

• Authors: Giulia Briselli and Libertad González.
• BSE Working Paper: 1506 | September 25
• Keywords: fertility , gender norms , female labor force participation
• JEL codes: J13, J16, J21

We propose that men’s reluctance to increase their participation in childcare and household chores is an important factor keeping both fertility and women’s employment low in Europe. We first show that, over time, European women express a stronger desire for men increasing their participation in home production. This trend is not observed for men. We propose a toy model of the household that illustrates how men’s refusal to contribute to childcare can have negative effects on both fertility and women’s labor supply. Finally, we use cross-country panel data and a two-way fixed effects specification to show that countries where the gender divergence in attitudes is more pronounced display both lower birth-rates and lower female employment rates.