This paper discusses several approaches to examining the relationship between child care and mothers' labor supply. The focus is on child care for children aged 0-3, because this is a critical period for working mothers and their children and because most European and American households with...

Economic models of household behavior typically yield the prediction that increases in schooling levels and wage rates of married women lead to increases in their labor supply and reductions in fertility. In Italy, as well as in other Southern European countries, low labor market participation...

In recent years the increase in the divorce rate in many advanced countries and the predominance of female-headed families among the poor has generated much interest in the relationship between divorce and the welfare of mothers and children. In this paper I will review a small body of economic...