Please use this identifier to cite or link to this item: https://hdl.handle.net/10419/185215 
Year of Publication: 
2018
Series/Report no.: 
IZA Discussion Papers No. 11755
Publisher: 
Institute of Labor Economics (IZA), Bonn
Abstract: 
We show that sleep deprivation exerts strong negative effects on mothers' labour market performance. To isolate exogenous variations in maternal sleep, we exploit unique variations in child sleep disruption using a UK panel dataset that follows mother-child pairs through time. We find that sleeping one hour less per night on average significantly decreases maternal labour force participation, the number of hours worked, and household income. We identify one mechanism driving the effects, namely the influence of maternal sleep on selection into full-time versus part-time work. Increased schedule flexibility for mothers with sufficient tenure mitigates the negative effects of sleep deprivation.
Subjects: 
child sleep
sleep
maternal employment
working hours
workplace flexibility
ALSPAC
JEL: 
J13
J22
I18
J28
Document Type: 
Working Paper

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