The Study On Gender Income Gap Effect Of Birth And Its Impact Mechanism

The gender income gap is a problem which always exists in China.The existing research focuses on exploring the causes of gender income gap at the cross-sectional level,trying to find answers from the labor market and blaming them on unobservable factors such as gender discrimination.From the family level,this paper explores the dynamic impact of fertility on the gender income gap,and the specific impact path.On this basis,it is necessary to explore whether women’s employment decision after birth is a voluntary choice or mother penalty.Using CFPS2010-2016 tracking survey data and fixed-effects model,this paper first proves that fertility will significantly reduce women’s income,a decline of about 28%,which is the main reason for the increasing income gap between men and women in the life cycle.On this basis,this paper explores the path of fertility to the gender income gap through the regression of the full-sample labor supply index and the return of births in the continuous employment sample.Estimation results showed that fertility can significantly reduce employment rate of women,decreased about 13.7%.The regression results for the continuous employment sample show that,in the short term,fertility has no significant effect on the wage rate of employed women.However,from the perspective of long-term dynamics,the wage growth rate of employed women will lag far behind that of men,which will eventually lead to the gradual expansion of gender wage gap.Finally,this paper analyzes the choice mechanism of female fertility and employment decision-making by introducing the concept of parenting value utility.The results of the study show that,for highly-educated women,leaving the labor market after birth can significantly reduce individual utility,and the negative impact of childbearing on employment is a parental punishment.For low-educated women,whether or not to participate in employment after childbearing does not reduce individual utility.It is the result of a self-selection.Based on the above research results,this paper proposes that,when the protection policy for women is introduced,should consider the actual situation.While taking into account women’s employment rights,we should also respect the choice of women to voluntarily withdraw from the labor market,and provide better public child care services and policies which protect full-time mothers’ rights for the women who return to the family.