We study how the duration of paid parental leave affects the accumulation of cognitive skills among children. Using a reform which extended parental leave benefits from 12 to 15 months for Swedish children born after August 1988 we evaluate the effects of prolonged parental leave on children’s test scores and grades at age 16.
We show that, on average, the reform had no effect on children’s scholastic performance. However, we do find positive effects for children of well-educated mothers, a result that is robust to a number of different specifications.
That is Qian Liu in Economic Analysis and Policy.
Two caveats. First, the alternative in Sweden is pretty good: subsidized day care. Second, there could be diminishing returns. I imagine the first six months of leave matter more than the 13th to 15th months.
When my wife started her position at a humanitarian organization, she and the other new execs were told that maternity leave could be taken… out of their accumulated sick days. Her fellow new colleague, from Ireland, leaned across the desk to the HR person: “Pregnancy,” she said “is not a sickness.”
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Wait. Children are exogenous? That’s not what I got from the birds and the bees talk.
Link is bad. Was this it?
http://ideas.repec.org/p/hhs/ifauwp/2009_014.html
Fixed. Thanks.
Though the main benefit of early childhood education is *not* in test scores but in “socialization” like not dropping out of school, committing less crime etc., so I would argue that this probably isn’t looking at the relevant outcome since even earlier nurturing probably is even less likely to affect kids through school performance but rather through socialization type stuff.
(See any number of papers; a recent example is David Deming’s AEJ paper on head start).
Oh man, that was awesome. Because the thing that should be covered by health insurance is “sickness,” not “health.”
… which is why it shouldn’t be covered by health insurance.
just kidding, but …