Speaker:  Jesus M. Carro
Universidad Carlos III de Madrid
Department of Economics

Presentation
The onset of female labor market participation and the role of the mothers

Jointly with: CEMAPRE Seminars

Abstract
Female labor participation has increased in most countries. Although the literature has
advanced several explanations for this fact, the reasons for the onset of female labor mar-
ket participation are not well understood. Among other factors, productivity differentials,
and human capital accumulation have been proposed as fundamentals to understand the
trends in female work status. Recently, economists have established that culture differ-
ences affect economic outcomes and in particular the levels of female labor force partici-
pation. Previous studies also showed that culture is transmitted from parents to children
and, therefore, transitory shocks to preferences or beliefs may have long-run impacts on
economic outcomes. To our knowledge, there are no studies which try to directly evaluate
the role of intergenerational transmission of preferences and beliefs within the family in the
onset of female labor market participation. We argue that intergenerational family data
from parish records from the 18 th and 19th century provide us with a nice opportunity
to evaluate the importance of this mechanism for persistence in the work status of female
workers. Using church registry data from several Portuguese settlements, we propose to
estimate a reduced-form dynamic discrete choice model. Importantly, we address the
problem of missing values, which so often affects historical records using a methodology
recently proposed by Ramalho and Smith (2012). Preliminary results show a positive and
statistically significant effect of the mother working status on the daughter's probability
of working across different model specifications. We interpret such an effect as evidence
of intergenerational family transmission of preferences and/or beliefs.

ORGANIZING TEAM
This seminars series is organized by Margarida Abreu (ECO), Raquel M. Gaspar (FIN/MG) and Isabel Proença (QM).

MEETING THE SPEAKER All speakers are available to meet faculty at ISEG during the afternoon after the talk. Slots are limited. To book your time with the speaker, contact one of the coordination team members.

MAILING LIST To join the ISEG 2S Seminar Mailing List and receive regular information contact Filomena Ferreira .

PARKING If you come to the seminars at ISEG by car, please contact Filomena Ferreira to assure your entrance into the park.