Please use this identifier to cite or link to this item: https://hdl.handle.net/10419/87534 
Year of Publication: 
2012
Series/Report no.: 
Tinbergen Institute Discussion Paper No. 12-093/I
Publisher: 
Tinbergen Institute, Amsterdam and Rotterdam
Abstract: 
Over the period 2005-2009 the Dutch government increased childcare subsidies substantially, reducing the average effective parental fee by 50%, and extended subsidies to so-called guestparent care. We estimate the labour supply effect of this reform with a difference-in-differences strategy, using parents with older children as a control group. We find that the reform had a moderately sized impact on labour supply. Furthermore, the effects are an upper bound since there was also an increase in an earned income tax credit for the same treatment group over the same period. The joint reform increased the maternal employment rate by 2.3%-points (3.0%). Average hours worked by mothers increased by 1.1 hours per week (6.2%). Decomposing the hours effect we find that most of the increase in hours is due to the intensive margin response. A number of robustness checks confirm our results.
Subjects: 
Childcare subsidies
labour participation
hours worked
difference-in-differences
JEL: 
C21
H40
J13
J22
Persistent Identifier of the first edition: 
Document Type: 
Working Paper

Files in This Item:
File
Size
484.48 kB





Items in EconStor are protected by copyright, with all rights reserved, unless otherwise indicated.