"One-third of children in the United States are born to unmarried parents. A substantial number of black and Hispanic children live with a never-married mother. Children of never-married mothers are more likely to drop out of high school, repeat grades, and have behavioral problems than are...

The human capital explanation of sex differences in wages is that women intend to work in the labor market more intermittently than men, and therefore invest less. This lower investment leads to lower wages and wage growth. The alternative "feedback" hypothesis consistent with the same facts is...

We explore several problems in drawing causal inferences from cross-sectional relationships between marriage, motherhood, and wages. We find that heterogeneity leads to biased estimates of the "direct" effects of marriage and motherhood on wages (i.e., effects net of experience and tenure);...

One-third of children in the United States are born to unmarried parents. A substantial number of black and Hispanic children live with a never-married mother. Children of never-married mothers are more likely to drop out of high school, repeat grades, and have behavioral problems than are...

We explore several problems in drawing causal inferences from cross-sectional relationships between marriage, motherhood, and wages. We find that heterogeneity leads to biased estimates of the quot;directquot; effects of marriage and motherhood on wages (i.e., effects net of experience and...

Given that changes in the availability of men in the marriage market should affect marriage decisions, we use incarceration rates for men as an instrumental variable for family structure in estimating the effect of never-married motherhood on the likelihood that children drop out of high school,...