Job Mobility and the Entry into Parenthood: A Longitudinal Study on Finnish Women

Wioletta Grzenda , SGH Warsaw School of Economics
Jessica Nisén, University of Turku

The continued postponement of parenthood raises questions about how employment trajectories shape fertility decisions. While previous research has shown that women’s labour market attachment is increasingly often positively related to the entry into motherhood, little attention has been paid to the role of job mobility. We address this gap by examining whether the job mobility across employers is associated with the timing of a first childbirth. We formulate two competing hypotheses: frequent job changes may signal career advancement and an improved employer-employee match, increasing the likelihood of entering motherhood; alternatively, job changes may indicate an unstable labour market position, lowering the likelihood of entering motherhood. We utilise Finnish full-population register data on women born in 1979, followed annually from the age of 18 to 39. Job mobility is measured as a time-varying cumulative number of contracts with a new employer, and survival analysis is applied to estimate the hazard of a first birth. Our findings indicate that women who have accumulated more job changes generally have a higher rate of entering parenthood. This association is especially pronounced at older ages. These findings suggest that career progression and an improved employer-employee match may increase women’s readiness to enter motherhood. At the same time, the pursuit of a stable and rewarding employment may contribute to the postponement of parenthood, even in a context with strong work-family reconciliation policies.

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 Presented in Session 77. Flash Session Fertility, Economic Conditions and Inequality