ERF 26th Annual Conference
Public Preschool and Maternal Labor Supply in Algeria: Evidence from a Natural Experiment
No.
ERF26_209
Publisher
ERF
Date
August, 2020
Topic
J5. Labor–Management Relations, Trade Unions, and Collective Bargaining
H5. National Government Expenditures and Related Policies
I2. Education and Research Institutions
Globally, female labor force participation rates have remained low and stagnant for some time. What will it take to increase women’s participation? We test the potential of public pre-primary to reduce the opportunity cost of work for women and increase their participation using a natural experiment in Algeria. Publicly provided pre-primary in Algeria expanded from 6% enrollment in 2005 to 79% in 2011. We use a discontinuity in whether children are eligible, based on their birthdates, to identify the effect of this expansion on women’s labor market outcomes. We find that increased access to pre-primary education decreased women’s participation. We explain this counter-intuitive result by the fact that pre-primary education is a half day, making it more difficult for women to work than if they used full-day nursery care.
Authors
Caroline Krafft
Associate Professor, Humphrey School of Public Affairs,...
Research Fellows
Moundir Lassassi
Research Director, Research Centre in Applied Economics...