We sharpen tests for ‘discouragement’ and ‘added worker’ effects by splitting the explanatory variable – the unemployment rate – into a short-term component and a long-term component. While short-term unemployment (STU) might not result in additional workers on a large scale, long-term unemployment (LTU) reduces household income more, increasing the need for additional income. On the other hand, it may discourage older workers for psychological and sociological reasons. Applying our model to the German labour market, these hypotheses could be confirmed. Even for men, about whom only a few empirical studies on this issue are available, distinguishing between STU and LTU reveals added worker as well as discouragement effects. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]
This article estimates the long-term legacies of female labour force mobilization on women’s family formation outcomes such as marriage, age at first marriage and divorce. We identify the long-term marriage effects of female labour force mobilization by exploring postwar mandatory employment in Germany. Using difference-in-differences analysis, we find that participation in postwar reconstruction efforts increased women’s probability of being currently married, ever married and marrying at younger ages. We also find that postwar employment had no differential effect on divorce rates of the affected cohorts of women. These results persist after accounting for the potential changes in the composition of the population, demand for female labour, war relief payments and postwar state-specific policies. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]