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Long-term Changes in Married Couples' Labor Supply and Taxes: Evidence from the US and Europe Since the 1980s

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  • Alexander Bick
  • Bettina Brüggemann
  • Nicola Fuchs-Schündeln
  • Hannah Paule-Paludkiewicz

Abstract

We document the time-series of employment rates and hours worked per employed by married couples in the US and seven European countries (Belgium, France, Germany, Italy, the Netherlands, Portugal, and the UK) from the early 1980s through 2016. Relying on a model of joint household labor supply decisions, we quantitatively analyze the role of non-linear labor income taxes for explaining the evolution of hours worked of married couples over time, using as inputs the full country- and year-specific statutory labor income tax codes. We further evaluate the role of consumption taxes, gender and educational wage premia, and the educational composition. The model is quite successful in replicating the time series behavior of hours worked per employed married woman, with labor income taxes being the key driving force. It does however capture only part of the secular increase in married women’s employment rates in the 1980s and early 1990s, suggesting an important role for factors not considered in this paper. We will make the non-linear tax codes used as an input into the analysis available as a user-friendly and easily integrable set of Matlab codes.

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  • Alexander Bick & Bettina Brüggemann & Nicola Fuchs-Schündeln & Hannah Paule-Paludkiewicz, 2018. "Long-term Changes in Married Couples' Labor Supply and Taxes: Evidence from the US and Europe Since the 1980s," NBER Working Papers 24995, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
  • Handle: RePEc:nbr:nberwo:24995
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    Cited by:

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    3. Youngsoo Jang & Minchul Yum, 2022. "Nonlinear Occupations and Female Labor Supply Over Time," Review of Economic Dynamics, Elsevier for the Society for Economic Dynamics, vol. 46, pages 51-73, October.
    4. Tom Günther & Ulrich C. Schneider & Fabian Stürmer-Heiber, 2023. "Working More for Less: Part-time Penalties Across the Working Hours Distribution?," Berlin School of Economics Discussion Papers 0025, Berlin School of Economics.
    5. Egor Malkov, 2021. "Welfare Effects of Labor Income Tax Changes on Married Couples: A Sufficient Statistics Approach," Papers 2108.09981, arXiv.org, revised Sep 2021.
    6. Youngsoo Jang & Minchul Yum, 2022. "Nonlinear Occupations and Female Labor Supply Over Time," Review of Economic Dynamics, Elsevier for the Society for Economic Dynamics, vol. 46, pages 51-73, October.

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    More about this item

    JEL classification:

    • E24 - Macroeconomics and Monetary Economics - - Consumption, Saving, Production, Employment, and Investment - - - Employment; Unemployment; Wages; Intergenerational Income Distribution; Aggregate Human Capital; Aggregate Labor Productivity
    • H24 - Public Economics - - Taxation, Subsidies, and Revenue - - - Personal Income and Other Nonbusiness Taxes and Subsidies
    • J22 - Labor and Demographic Economics - - Demand and Supply of Labor - - - Time Allocation and Labor Supply

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