The Possibility of Pursuing Both Marriage/Childbirth and Employment, and the Development of Nursery Schools

Abstract

This study examines trends in the possibility of pursuing both marriage/childbirth and employment among women over the past twenty-five years by measuring the rate of job separation due to marriage/childbirth. I conducted a pseudo-panel analysis using age-group-specific National Census data from 1980 to 2005 as the birth cohort data. The results yielded a rate of job separation due to marriage/childbirth of 86.3 percent, a figure that has remained virtually unchanged since 1980 regardless of age at the time of marriage. Even when broken down by prefecture, the data indicate no change in the job separation rate over time, although major differences between prefectures can be observed. The nature of these results suggests that the job separation rate is stable over time and governed by a key factor (or factors) that differs between regions. Among the factors that have been identified in previous studies, the development of nursery schools is statistically consistent and has been shown to be a major determinant of the job separation rate. On the other hand, child-care-leave programs and three-generation cohabitation rates have not proved statistically convincing.