The Impact Of Children’s Health And Insurance Status On Parental Labor Supply Behavior

Labor resources are an important driving force for the economic development of China.However,in recent years,the total labor resources of China have been declining,and the problem of aging labor has become increasingly serious.How to ensure the stability of labor supply has become an urgent problem to be solved in China.With the development of miniaturization of family structure caused by industrialization and urbanization and the introduction of policies such as the universal two-child policy,the influence of children on adult labor supply is becoming more and more significant.Among the influences,child health as a key factor which affects the future development of children has a strong influence on the parental labor supply behavior.There have been a few literatures on the relationship between child health and parental labor supply behavior,without exploring the mechanism of action.Therefore,this paper constructs the corresponding theoretical model according to the principle of utility maximization,and specifically deduces the influence path of children’s health on parental labor supply.On this basis,it further explains the principle of parental division of labor and the mechanism of children’s medical insurance.In the empirical part,this paper establishes an econometric model around the theoretical hypothesis,and uses the cross-sectional data in 2016 of the Chinese Family Panel Studies(CFPS)database for regression testing.The study found that:(1)the decline in the level of child’s health will significantly reduce mother’s working hours,but will not prompt her to directly withdraw from the labor market.While the probability of participating in the work and the working hours will increase significantly for the father;For parents with different educational levels,those parents with low education levels are more susceptible to the changes of their children’s health.When the health level of children declines,the working hours of mothers with low education levels will decrease significantly,and for fathers with low education levels,it will increase their probability of participation in work and their working hours,while the labor supply of parents with high education level has not changed significantly;(3)For families with different income levels,mothers of high-income families will significantly reduce their working hours when their children’s health level declines.Compared with the father of high-income families,the father of low-income families is more likely to work and significantly increase working hours;(4)when the child’s health damage affects the parent’s labor supply behavior,whether the child is participating in medical insurance has no significant regulatory effect.It can be seen from the empirical research results that when faced with the health problem of children,children’s medical insurance can not significantly alleviate the family’s financial constraints in China,and the efficacy of children’s medical insurance is still to be promoted by the policy.Finally,based on the empirical results,this paper proposes some relevant policy recommendations.