The effect of women´s rights on women´s welfare

Evidence from a natural experiment

Between the late 1960s and the 1990s vast changes in social norms and institutions took place in relation to women´s rights have brought women higher welfare. Using individual level data on life satisfaction and focusing on the staggered timing of law changes on abortion rights in twelfe European countries. The author optained an average treatment effect on the treated from differences - in - differences. The identification strategy uses the fact that exposure to women´s rights varied by gender, country of residence and date of birth. It is shown that the extension of abortion rights is strongly linked to an increase in life satisfaction of women of childbearing age. The indroduction of the pill in national public policies had an analogous effect, while mutual consent divorce laws decreased women´s welfare. Being in a country with high maternity protection dos not affect the results. These findings are true after controlling for age effects, unobserved heterogeneity across countries and time, and country-specific trends. It is robust to various econometric concerns.

Inventary ID

b1547

Authors

Silvia Pezzini

Date

2005

Language

English

Category

Bücher