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The past two decades in Western European societies have been marked by a decline in fertility rates together with an increase in women's work-force participation. This has given rise to a massive transformation in traditional patterns of relationships, especially in gender roles and family size. This paper will examine the outcome of the birth of a child and link this outcome to specific family policies in Denmark, France, Germany, Greece, Ireland, Italy, Luxembourg, Portugal, Spain, and the United Kingdom. The outcome of the birth of a child will be measured in the data by comparing the pre-child-birth income and its sources to the post-child-birth income and its sources. How does the financial impact of having a child differ in different countries? What is the impact of the compensation provided by the state in terms of transfer benefits for families? What is the impact on women's labor force activity? What are the changes in the wage income of the family members? This research uses the Consortium of Household panels for European socio-economic Research (CHER) longitudinal panel from 1990 to 2001 in the 10 European countries. Data provide for a detailed cross-national comparison before and after the birth of a child for market work, wage income, and public transfer income, including family benefits. The results indicate that there are important differences among the European countries studied. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

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The recent judgement by the European Court of Human Rights in the Odievre v France case has denied some adopted people the right to access identifying information about their family of origin. Yet, in the UK, adopted people have enjoyed the right to access identifying information for many years. The evidence from practice and research has demonstrated the positive benefits adopted people and their binh and adoptive relatives have gained from an open record policy. In this paper, the authors argue that denying some adopted people access to information that could enhance their personal identity creates an act of discrimination. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Abstract: There is a growing tendency to see cohabitation as an equivalent alternative to marriage, and this article investigates how different these two unions are for a woman''s financial satisfaction and income sharing in Denmark, France and Great Britain. The analysis suggests that a woman''s financial satisfaction decreases with cohabitation as opposed to marriage due perhaps to the lack of income pooling of cohabiters. The paper however finds substantial heterogeneity among married couples; the difference between marriage and cohabitation is not only a result of the legal protection obtained by the marriage contract but is better explained by the level of relationship investment in marriage in terms of its duration. The systematic comparison of the three institutional frameworks points out that Denmark, as the country where marriage and cohabitation are most equated by law, is surprisingly the country where the relative difference between marriage and cohabitation for a woman''s financial satisfaction is the greatest. No relative variation in results is observed between Great Britain and France. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

Couple households may separate over time. The OECD equivalence scale is used to compare the income situation of post separation households with the pre-separation households. This scale makes assumptions about the needs of adults and children as well as economies of scale. The impact of these assumptions is checked by varying the economy of scale factor; varying the cost of a child and varying the assumptions of allocating the cost of a child between households after separation. Our main finding is that the situation of the woman's household relative to the man's household remains the same as under the original OECD scale even when the assumptions are changed. We conclude, therefore, that our findings based on OECD scale are valid. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]