| Number |
CREPEDP-148 |
| Publication Date |
October 2023 |
| Title |
On the Trends of Technology, Family Formation, and
Women’s Time Allocation
|
| Author |
Sagiri Kitao and Kanato Nakakuni
|
| Abstract |
Over the past 50 years, Japan has witnessed a dramatic decline in fertility and
marriage rates, along with a rise in educational attainment, particularly among
women. Married women now dedicate significantly less time on housework and
more time on leisure and childcare. We develop a model that allows for various
forms of technological change and relative prices surrounding families, and quantify
their roles to account for the trends of family formation and time allocation. We find
that neutral productivity growth leads to an increase in leisure time and a decrease
in work hours. Technological changes that favor female labor supply and rises in
the time and financial costs of childcare are the main factors contributing to the
decline in fertility and marriage rates. Skill-biased technological change contributes
to the rise in education levels, while advancements of home production technology
explain the shift in married women’s time allocation from housework to the market
work.
|
| Keywords |
Fertility, Marriage, Home Production, Women’s Time Allocation,
Skill-biased Technological Change, Gender-biased Technological Change, Japan. |
| Other information |
Paper in English (41 pages) |