Peer-reviewed article
Parental Unemployment, Social Insurance and Child Well-Being Across Countries
Kerstin Hansen, Alois Stutzer ·
Summary
Written by AI, not yet AICS's view · claude-sonnet-5-5The study uses repeated cross-sectional survey data on school-aged children in Europe, the Middle East and North America. It looks at how children's life satisfaction relates to whether their parents are employed. Parental unemployment is strongly linked to lower life satisfaction in children. More generous unemployment benefits reduce this link for fathers' unemployment, but not for mothers'. The harm from fathers' unemployment appears larger where social work norms are stricter.
Key points
- Parental unemployment is strongly negatively related to children's life satisfaction across countries and years.
- The relationship is moderated by the generosity of unemployment benefits.
- A higher benefit replacement rate reduces the negative effects of fathers' unemployment, but not mothers'.
- The buffering effect of unemployment insurance remains when social work norms are considered.
- Spillover effects of paternal unemployment appear more pronounced where social work norms are stricter.
Limitations
The abstract describes associations in repeated cross-sectional data, so it cannot show that unemployment or benefits cause changes in children's well-being. It does not name the countries or give effect sizes. The document type is not stated, though it reads like a journal article.
Abstract
Based on a unique repeated cross-sectional data set of school-aged children in Europe, the Middle East and North America, we analyze how children's subjective well-being is related to parents' employment status, depending on the institutional context. We find that parental unemployment is strongly negatively related to children's life satisfaction across countries and years. The effect is thereby moderated by the generosity of unemployment benefits. Exploiting across- and within-country variation, our results suggest that a higher benefit replacement rate alleviates the negative effects of fathers', but not mothers', unemployment. We further test the robustness of our results considering unemployment benefits jointly with social work norms. While the buffering effect of unemployment insurance remains, the spillover effects of paternal unemployment seem to be more pronounced in environments with stricter social work norms.