The added worker effect (AWE) measures the entry of individuals into the labor force due to their partners' job loss. We propose a new method to calculate the AWE, which allows us to estimate its effect on any labor market outcome. We show that the AWE reduces the fraction of households with two...

This paper examines evidence on the role of assimilation versus source country culture in influencing immigrant women's behavior in the United States – looking both over time with immigrants' residence in the United States and across immigrant generations. It focuses particularly on labor...

Based on well-known evidence on labor supply elasticities, several authors have concluded that women should be taxed at lower rates than men. We evaluate the quantitative implications of taxing women at a lower rate than men. Relative to the current system of taxation, setting a proportional tax...

In this paper we use New Immigrant Survey data to investigate the impact of immigrant women's own labor supply prior to migrating and female labor supply in their source country to provide evidence on the role of human capital and culture in affecting their labor supply and wages in the United...

Using March Current Population Survey (CPS) data, we investigate married women's labor supply behavior from 1980 to 2000. We find that their labor supply function for annual hours shifted sharply to the right in the 1980s, with little shift in the 1990s. In an accounting sense, this is the major...

The total fertility rate is well below its replacement level of 2.1 children in high-income countries. Why do women choose such low fertility levels? We study how labor market frictions affect the fertility of college-educated women. We focus on two frictions: uncertainty created by dual labor...

There is a well-known gender difference in time allocation within the household, which has important implications for gender differences in labor market outcomes. We ask how malleable this gender difference in time allocation is to culture. In particular, we ask if US immigrants allocate tasks...

Marriage has declined since 1960, with the drop being bigger for non-college educated individuals versus college educated ones. Divorce has increased, more so for the non-college educated. Additionally, positive assortative mating has risen. Income inequality among households has also widened. A...

We use micro data from the U.S. Internal Revenue Service to document how households' tax liabilities vary with income, marital status and the number of dependents. We report facts on the distributions of average and marginal taxes, properties of the joint distributions of taxes paid and income,...

In 1990, the US had the sixth highest female labor participation rate among 22 OECD countries. By 2010, its rank had fallen to 17th. We find that the expansion of "family-friendly" policies including parental leave and part-time work entitlements in other OECD countries explains 28-29% of the...