Universitat Pompeu Fabra
This paper examines the effects of paternity leave on maternal postpartum health. Using administrative data and a difference-in-discontinuities design, we compare mothers in households with likely eligible fathers to comparable control groups, accounting for seasonal variation around the implementation cutoffs. The results show limited effects on overall healthcare use and physical health during the first nine months after childbirth. However, we find suggestive evidence of significant improvements in maternal mental health following the most recent expansion of paternity leave. A better labor market attachment seems to be one potential mechanism.
English
Paternity leave; Parental leave; Maternal health; Postpartum
This is an Open Access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International, which permits unrestricted use, distribution and reproduction in any medium provided that the original work is properly attributed.
https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/
