Essays on Women in the Labor Market

Abstract

This dissertation comprises three essays that examine how policy, institutions, and social constraints shape women’s labor market outcomes across diverse economic and cultural contexts. Chapter 1 studies the 2019 transformation of Mexico’s largest public childcare program and evaluates its effects on women’s labor market behavior. Chapter 2 analyzes the impact of sexual harassment and perceived safety on women’s labor market outcomes in urban Pakistan, using novel survey data and an instrumental variables strategy. Chapter 3 examines paid parental leave laws in California and New Jersey in the United States, focusing on intra-household labor supply adjustments around childbirth, with heterogeneous effects by education and race. Taken together, these essays are connected by a common focus on women’s labor supply decisions as outcomes of interacting policy environments, household dynamics, and social constraints, jointly shaping women’s labor market behavior.