TY - JOUR
T1 - Work or housework? Mincer’s hypothesis and the labor supply elasticity of married women in Japan
AU - Muroga, Kiho
N1 - Funding Information:
I thank two anonymous referees and journal editor for their detailed comments. Deepest appreciation is expressed to my advisor, Daiji Kawaguchi, for his continued guidance and support, and I am also grateful to Ryo Kambayashi, Izumi Yokoyama, Ken Yamada, Taiyo Fukai, and seminar participants at Hitotsubashi University and Niigata University for their useful comments and discussions from which this study has greatly benefitted. This research is supported by the Resampling Data Usage Promotion Program of Hitotsubashi University. Editing service was provided by Philip MacLellan. Any errors and omissions remain the responsibility of the author.
Publisher Copyright:
© 2020, Japanese Economic Association.
PY - 2020/4/1
Y1 - 2020/4/1
N2 - Married women exhibit more elastic labor supply responses to wage changes than do single women or men. Mincer (Aspects of labor economics, Princeton University Press, Princeton, 1962) argued that this is explained by a high elasticity of substitution between market work and home production. To test this hypothesis, I use a sharp change in Japanese tax rates to estimate labor supply and home production elasticities for Japanese workers. The results support Mincer's hypothesis: market and home production are near-perfect substitutes for married Japanese women, while home production effects are modest for other demographic groups. These results contrast with those for the USA, where male and female elasticities have been converging.
AB - Married women exhibit more elastic labor supply responses to wage changes than do single women or men. Mincer (Aspects of labor economics, Princeton University Press, Princeton, 1962) argued that this is explained by a high elasticity of substitution between market work and home production. To test this hypothesis, I use a sharp change in Japanese tax rates to estimate labor supply and home production elasticities for Japanese workers. The results support Mincer's hypothesis: market and home production are near-perfect substitutes for married Japanese women, while home production effects are modest for other demographic groups. These results contrast with those for the USA, where male and female elasticities have been converging.
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U2 - 10.1007/s42973-019-00017-8
DO - 10.1007/s42973-019-00017-8
M3 - Article
AN - SCOPUS:85077519717
SN - 1352-4739
VL - 71
SP - 303
EP - 347
JO - Japanese Economic Review
JF - Japanese Economic Review
IS - 2
ER -