Fertility and female employment in Europe

Isabel Oliveira, ISCTE-IUL
Maria Cristina S. Gomes, SACSJP - Universidade de Aveiro
Maria Luís R. Pinto, SACSJP - Universidade de Aveiro
Miguel Cabrita, ISCTE-IUL

This research aims to analyze the positive association between fertility and female employment by means of decomposing such a relationship at a global level in the two components of this association: the part-time and full-time relations with fertility. In the European countries the part-time and full-time options in the labor market are not uniformly distributed. In some countries, part-time opportunities are a real alternative for women but, in others, employment is mostly in full-time jobs. This option seems to have significant consequences for fertility decisions of individuals and for fertility levels. At a macro-level, the relationship between fertility and employment in current days is clearly positive, but this positive sign in the correlation is a consequence from the positive association between fertility and part-time (r=0.42) since there is an almost non-existent correlation with the full-time employment (r=0.08). The decomposition of the current global positive association between fertility and employment can in the two different types of job commitment expose the impact of the part-time employment in the overall macro-level association. This effect is also patent in the correlation between fertility and childcare use in different countries.