The Impact Of Fertility On Working Income And Family Labor Of Childbearing Age Group

Although women have made great progress relative to men in terms of education and labor force participation since the Industrial Revolution,gender inequalities in income and inequalities in the division of household labor persist in many countries.To explain the gender inequality in labor market and household division of labor,scholars have found that after giving birth,women tend to greatly increase the energy and time input in the family,thus reducing the investment in the labor market.The birth event explains the unequal phenomenon of the gender in the work income and the division of housework,namely,Motherhood Penalty.Like fertility events,gender-role attitude,which is people’s attitudes and perceptions about gender-related social norms and the division of social roles,influences the work and family life of people of childbearing age.Based on the influence of birth events on the gender-role attitude of the population of childbearing age,this paper explores the role of gender-role attitude in the motherhood penalty.First of all,through literature review,this paper introduces the concepts of fertility punishment and gender-role attitude and related research.According to the social structural theory,fertility will make the gender-role attitude change into traditional among people of childbearing age,so the gender-role attitude is regarded as a path to produce fertility punishment.Fertility may affect the gender-role attitude of women of childbearing age Which affects how much they earn at work and how much they spend at home.Secondly,using the data of China Family Panel Studies in 2020,this paper constructs a baseline regression model and a mediating effect model,to explore the impact of childbirth on work income and housework hours of the childbearing age group with the gender-role attitude as the intermediary.Finally,the empirical results show that childbearing will punish the working income of the childbearing age group and increase their housework time.Childbearing events will have a negative impact on the gender-role attitude in the childbearing age group.Childbearing will make the gender-role attitude in the childbearing age group tend to the traditional model and strengthen the traditional consciousness of gender division of labor.The gender-role attitude moderates the effect of childbearing on the female group’s work income and housework hours,and plays an intermediary role in the punishment brought by childbearing.This study correlates childbirth with gender-role attitude,and explores the effect of childbirth on gender-role attitude in the childbearing age group.It is found that fertility also has a certain "punishment effect" on gender-role attitude of the childbearing age group.The study also finds that in the influence of fertility on the punishment of work and the division of housework,gender role concepts play a mediating effect.Thus,it expands the path and mechanism of fertility punishment and contributes to a multidimensional understanding of the impact of fertility on the reproductive age group.In addition,the study of gender inequality from the perspective of fertility can help us better understand the impact of fertility on the population of childbearing age,and provide better policy assistance on the question of income penalty and domestic work,so as to provide a reference perspective for solving the problem of low fertility rate in China.