This paper describes the plant closing regulations adopted in Maine during the 1971-81 period and documents a pattern of relatively poor compliance with the advance notice and severance pay requirements of the law. Data on the number of workers laid off in major plant closings, on...

Nancy Folbre challenges the conventional economist’s assumption that parents have children for the same reason that they acquire pets--primarily for the pleasure of their company. Children become the workers and taxpayers of the next generation, and "investments" in them offer a significant...

This collection of essays features the debate among neoclassical, institutionalist and feminist theorists, providing an invaluable guide to the evolution of economic approaches to the family. The clash of paradigms illuminates some issues of profound concern to economics as a whole, such as the...

Our paper utilizes variation across the 50 U.S. states to examine the relationship between public expenditures on children and child outcomes. We find that public expenditures on children are related to better child outcomes across a wide range of indicators, including measures of child...

How should “care” be defined and measured in ways that enhance our understanding of the impact of economic development on women? This paper addresses this question, suggesting several possible approaches to the development of indices that would measure gender differences in responsibility...