Mother's Labor Supply in Fragile Families: The Role of Child Health

Abstract

A growing body of research indicates that low socioeconomic status in early childhood sets the stage for increasing disadvantages in both health and educational capital over the child's life course and can cause low socioeconomic status to persist for generations. The study estimated the effects of poor child health on the labor supply of mothers with one-year-old children using a national longitudinal data set that oversampled unmarried parents in the post welfare reform era. It was found that having a child in poor health reduces the mother's probability of working by eight percentage points and her hours of work by three per week when she is employed. Another important finding is that the father having children with another partner increases the mothers' labor supply, even after controlling for the focal child's health status and numerous other covariates.