Earnings Over the Lifecycle: The Mincer Earnings Function and Its Applications In 1958 Jacob Mincer pioneered an important approach to understand how earnings are distributed across the population. In the years since Mincer’s seminal work, he as well as his students and colleagues extended the original human capital model, reaching important conclusions about a whole array of observations perta...

Using a randomized experiment, this study examines whether offering afterschool care for children aged between 6 and 13 has an impact on labor market outcomes for women in Chile. The results show that program participation increases employment by 5% and labor force participation by 7%, while the intervention also generates substantial childcare substitution. The results also suggest that the pr...

This paper presents a theory where increases in female labor force participation and reductions in the gender wage-gap are generated as part of a single process of demographic transition, initially characterized by reductions in mortality and fertility. The paper suggests a relationship between gains in life expectancy and changes in the role of women in society that has not been identified bef...