Child care sentences to ponder

There is to date little or no evidence of beneficial effects of longer parental leave (or fathers’ quotas) on maternal participation and earnings. In most cases longer leave delays mothers’ return to work, without long-lasting consequences on their careers. More generous childcare funding instead encourages female participation whenever subsidized childcare replaces maternal childcare.

That is from a new NBER working paper by Stefania Albanesi, Claudia Olivetti, and Barbara Petrongolo.  Drawn from data across 24 countries.