Spouse Employment Research Articles

Effects of Health on Own and Spousal Employment and Income Using Acute Hospital Admissions

Ill-health can be expected to reduce employment and income. But are the effects sustained over time? Do they differ across the income distribution? And are there spillover effects on the employment and income of the spouse? We use matching combined with difference-in-differences to identify the causal effects of sudden illness, represented by acute hospitalisations, on employment and income up to six years after the health shock using linked Dutch hospital and tax register data. On average, an acute hospital admission lowers the employment probability by seven percentage points and results in a 5% loss of personal income (30% for those entering disability insurance) two years after the shock. There is no subsequent recovery in either employment or income. The distribution of ill-health contributes to income inequality: a health shock is both more likely to occur and to have a larger relative impact on employment and income at the bottom of the income distr ibution. There are large spillover effects: household income falls by 50% more than the income of the disabled person, and the employment probability of the spouse is reduced by 1.5 percentage points. The negative spousal employment effect is larger for male than for female spouses and in higher income households.

Spouse Employment in Iran's Statuary law and Family Support Bill

Spouse Employment in Iran's Statuary law and Family Support Bill

Leading Ladies Work to Improve Military Families' Mental Health

Back to table of contents Next article Community NewsFull AccessLeading Ladies Work to Improve Military Families' Mental HealthAaron LevinAaron LevinSearch for more papers by this authorPublished Online:20 May 2011https://doi.org/10.1176/pn.46.10.psychnews_46_10_1_2AbstractSupporting military families is becoming the new watchword in Washington, and leading that effort are the nation's first and second ladies, Michelle Obama and Jill Biden. On April 12, the two women—introduced by their husbands (who have significant jobs in their own right)—discussed further steps that they hope will enhance resilience among the families of military service members through a project called Joining Forces. At the White House on April 12, President Obama introduces First Lady Michelle Obama and Jill Biden, wife of Vice President Joe Biden. The two women are leading Joining Forces, a program to support military families and enhance their well-being. Credit: The White HouseTheir work is part of a White House program announced in January to enhance the well-being of military families, improve education for their children, increase child-care availability, and develop educational and career opportunities for military spouses. "[W]e're going to focus on the specific things our military families have told us they care most about and things that I think that all of us can make a unique contribution to—the areas of employment, education, and wellness, and that includes mental health," said Michelle Obama. "We're going to remind this nation that, just as our troops deserve the best support when dealing with the stresses of war and long deployments, so do military spouses and children." APA and other professional organizations are also bringing their expertise to bear on the effort. Two segments of the "Healthy Minds" TV series, hosted by psychiatrist Jeffrey Borenstein, M.D., and shown on PBS stations nationwide, will deal with veterans' mental health. The American Psychiatric Foundation (APF) and APA provide support for the program and advice on its contents, said Linda Bueno, director of industry relations for the APF. APA has also developed an algorithm for psychiatrists to help them follow up on the patient screening question, "Have you been in military service?" In her remarks, Obama noted that some large corporations have agreed to reserve job vacancies for employees who are the spouses of military personnel and are transferred to new locations where the businesses also operate. "Companies like Sears, Kmart, and Sam's Club are telling military spouses who work at their stores that if they move to a new duty station, they'll do their best to have a job waiting for those spouses," said Obama. Walmart and Target have also signed up. The large electronics firm Siemens is setting aside 10 percent of its open positions for veterans, she added. Such initiatives are critical for the families of enlisted personnel, because military salaries are low and often must be supplemented by a spouse's outside income. Frequent moves make it hard for the spouse to hold a job or find one in a new location, so stabilizing a spouse's employment can go a long way toward strengthening families already facing high levels of stress. Rotary and Lions clubs, which are strong in rural areas and small cities, also have been enlisted in the Joining Forces initiative. They are starting outreach efforts to find and help families living near military bases in their regions. Veterinarians have stepped up to donate some types of care for military families' pets.In addition, APA members organized several sessions at this month's annual meeting in Honolulu at which leading military and VA psychiatrists discussed combat trauma and readjustment problems, including one session focusing on the effects of the extended period of war on soldiers and their families. (Coverage of the annual meeting will begin in the next issue.) More on Michelle Obama's and Jill Biden's work to help military families is posted at <www.whitehouse.gov/blog/2011/04/13/president-vice-president-first-lady-and-dr-jill-biden-launch-joining-forces>. ISSUES NewArchived

The implications of cancer survivorship for spousal employment

The purpose of this research was to estimate employment effects for spouses of cancer survivors who were working at the time of the cancer diagnosis. Spouses of cancer survivors were drawn from the Penn State Cancer Survivor Survey. Comparable spouses of individuals without cancer were drawn from the Panel Survey of Income Dynamics. The final sample included 827 spouses of cancer survivors (542 husbands, 285 wives) and 2,766 spouses of individuals without cancer (1,459 husbands, 1,307 wives). Three employment outcomes were studied 2-6 years after diagnosis: whether working, whether working full time (35+ hours per week), and usual hours per week. We used propensity scores to match cases to controls 3:1. Wives of cancer survivors had a lower probability (-7.5 percentage points) of being employed 2-6 years after diagnosis (p = 0.036). They were slightly more likely to be working full time, while averaging 1.1 fewer hours per week overall, but these effects were not statistically significant. Cancer's effect on husbands was not significant for any of the employment outcomes. However, if survivor wives and husbands were working at follow-up, they had more than twice the odds of working full-time (wives OR = 2.18, p = 0.0004; husbands OR = 2.65, p = 0.012) and worked more hours per week than other spouses (wives 1.9, p = 0.041; husbands 1.5, p = 0.04). The implications to cancer survivors and their spouses of these results is that the employment of survivor spouses, especially of wives, is somewhat reshaped by cancer in the medium to long run. However, there is little or no effect on aggregate hours worked by spouses who were employed at diagnosis.

Immigration Distress and Associated Factors Among Vietnamese Women in Transnational Marriages in Taiwan

The purpose of this study was to explore the types and predictors of immigration distress among Vietnamese women in transnational marriages in Taiwan. A cross-sectional survey with face-to-face interviews was conducted for data collection. A convenient sample of 203 Vietnamese women in transnational marriages in southern Taiwan was recruited. The Demographic Inventory measured the participants' age, education, employment status, religion, length of residency and number of children, as well as their spouse's age, education, employment status and religion. The Demand of Immigration Specific Distress scale measured the level of distress and had six subscales: loss, novelty, occupational adjustment, language accommodation, discrimination and alienation. Among the 203 participants, 6.4% had a high level of immigration distress; 91.1% had moderate distress; and 2.5% had minor distress. Higher mean scores were found for the loss, novelty and language accommodation subscales of the Demand of Immigration Specific Distress scale. Participant's ( r = 0.321, p < 0.01) and spouse's ( r = 0.375, p < 0.01) unemployment, and more children ( r = 0.129, p < 0.05) led to greater immigration distress. Length of residency in Taiwan ( r = 0.576, p < 0.001) was an effective predictor of immigration distress. It indicated that the participants who had stayed fewer years in Taiwan had a higher level of immigrant distress. Health care professionals need to be aware that the female newcomers in transnational marriages are highly susceptible to immigration distress. The study suggests that healthcare professionals need to provide a comprehensive assessment of immigration distress to detect health problems early and administer culturally appropriate healthcare for immigrant women in transnational marriages.

Alone in the Ivory Tower

The authors use data from the 2000 Census Public Use Microdata Sample to examine the likelihood of a birth event, defined as the household presence of a child younger than 2 years, for male and female professionals. Physicians have the highest rate of birth events, followed in order by attorneys and academics. Within each profession men have more birth events than women. For men, occupational variation in birth events can be explained by marital status, income, and spousal employment. These factors only partially account for occupational differences in birth events for women.

Family Job Search, Wage Bargaining, and Optimal Unemployment Insurance

Abstract In this paper we develop an equilibrium search and matching model where two-person families as well as singles participate in the labor market. We show that equilibrium entails wage dispersion among equally productive risk-averse workers. Marital status as well as spousal labor market status matters for wage outcomes. In general, employed members of two-person families receive higher wages than employed singles. The model is applied to a welfare analysis of alternative unemployment insurance systems, recognizing the role of spousal employment as a partial substitute for public insurance. The optimal system involves benefit differentiation based on marital status as well as spousal labor market status.

Family Job Search, Wage Bargaining, and Optimal Unemployment Insurance

The paper develops an equilibrium search and matching model where two-person families as well as singles participate in the labor market. We show that equilibrium entails wage dispersion among equally productive risk-averse workers. Marital status as well as spousal labor market status matter for wage outcomes. In general, employed members of two-person families receive higher wages than employed singles. The model is applied to a welfare analysis of alternative unemployment insurance systems, recognizing the role of spousal employment as a partial substitute for public insurance. The optimal system involves benefit differentiation based on marital status as well as spousal labor market status. Optimal differentiation yields small welfare gains but gives rise to large wage differentials.

Family Job Search, Wage Bargaining, and Optimal Unemployment Insurance

The paper develops an equilibrium search and matching model where two-person families as well as singles participate in the labor market. We show that equilibrium entails wage dispersion among equally productive risk-averse workers. Marital status as well as spousal labor market status matter for wage outcomes. In general, employed members of two-person families receive higher wages than employed singles. The model is applied to a welfare analysis of alternative unemployment insurance systems, recognizing the role of spousal employment as a partial substitute for public insurance. The optimal system involves benefit differentiation based on marital status as well as spousal labor market status. Optimal differentiation yields small welfare gains but gives rise to large wage differentials.

Underemployment and Local Employment Dynamics: New Evidence

Workers in occupations that underutilize their experience, training, and skills are underemployed. Underemployment occurs for various reasons including productivity growth, spousal employment and income, family constraints, spatial restrictions, or personal preferences. Underemployment provides opportunities for selective job creation and economic growth. Using local employment dynamics (LED) and a statewide surve of the employed and nonworkers for 2004 and 2005, we examine the interaction between underemployment and LED. We show that poor local labor market conditions accentuate the perception of underemployment and lead to higher level of underemployment. Gender and ethnic differentials are also revealed in the characteristics of the underemployed.

Do changes in spousal employment status lead to domestic violence? Insights from a prospective study in Bangalore, India

The prevalence of physical domestic violence--violence against women perpetrated by husbands--is staggeringly high across the Indian subcontinent. Although gender-based power dynamics are thought to underlie women's vulnerability, relatively little is known about risk and protective factors. This prospective study in southern India examined the association between key economic aspects of gender-based power, namely spousal employment status, and physical domestic violence. In 2005-2006, 744 married women, aged 16-25, residing in low-income communities in Bangalore, India were enrolled in the study. Data were collected at enrollment, 12 and 24 months. Multivariable logistic regression models were used to examine the prospective association between women's employment status, their perceptions of their husband's employment stability, and domestic violence. Women who were unemployed at one visit and began employment by the next visit had an 80% higher odds of violence, as compared to women who maintained their unemployed status. Similarly, women whose husbands had stable employment at one visit and newly had difficulty with employment had 1.7 times the odds of violence, as compared to women whose husbands maintained their stable employment. To our knowledge, this study is the first from a developing country to confirm that changes in spousal employment status are associated with subsequent changes in violence risk. It points to the complex challenges of violence prevention, including the need for interventions among men and gender-transformative approaches to promote gender-equitable attitudes, practices and norms among men and women.

Getting in the game: An investigation of voluteering in sport among older adults

Volunteering is a positive leisure activity for older adults, yet this group has one of the lowest rates of volunteering across many nations, particularly in sport. The purpose of this qualitative study was to explore factors associated with volunteering in sport among older adults. Using Peters‐Davis, Burant, and Braunschweig's (2001) multidimensional framework, semi‐structured interviews with older adult sport volunteers (n=20,65 years and older) uncovered themes within structural, cultural, cognitive, and situational dimensions of volunteering behaviour. The findings revealed that the older adult volunteers had large social networks, past involvement in sport, and a history of volunteering. They reported becoming involved in sport volunteering as an opportunity to use their skills, for social connections, and to stay active. They also identified quality of health, awareness of volunteer opportunities, and spousal employment status as factors that influenced their volunteering. Preliminary implications for recruiting older adults to volunteering in sport, and directions for future research, are drawn from the findings.

It’s Time to “Do Economics” with Time-Use Data

Time-use data are old and familiar in survey research, with the first rudimentary efforts going back nearly a century; and large-scale regularly collected data sets have been available in other countries (e.g., Germany, France) since 1965. It is only with the American Time Use Survey (ATUS) since 2003, however, that the US has moved from the derri?re to the avant garde of data quality and quantity in the area of time-use surveys. With a large fraction of the economics profession resident in the US, and with American scholarly economics journals being the most prestigious outlets for economists worldwide, the advent of these data and the wider availability of similar, albeit smaller and/or irregular time-use surveys from other countries present economists with exciting opportunities. The difficulty with these data sets is that they offer us the temptation of the quick tabulation and the simple regression on items that economists have not previously dis cussed: It is very easy to present information on gender differences in time spent in various categories of home production, leisure and personal maintenance and to adjust these for a wide array of other demographic characteristics. It is simple to examine how employment status is correlated with the kinds of non-market activities that people undertake, and even to study how one's spouse's employment status relates to one's non-market activities. Economists can do these calculations, we have done them and, no doubt will continue to produce this kind of research. But where is the economics? What do we have to offer here that could not be done at least as well by sociologists? Unless economists think like economists?use economic theory to model behavior related to time use, discover facts that might alter our theories, and generate predictions derived from those modified theories, we have nothing special to offer in this area. Economists should leave demographic accounting of time use to folks in other disci plines?they may have an absolute advantage in such research, and we certainly lack a comparative advantage in it. What subjects can we as economists study with these data? A by no means exhaustive list of research areas, in some of which a few early studies have already been generated, might include:

Integrating realistic job previews and realistic living conditions previews

PurposeThe purpose of this paper is to explore the use of realistic job previews (RJPs) and realistic living conditions previews (RLCPs) during the recruitment of a group of internationally mobile knowledge workers who elect to go overseas independently rather than as part of an overseas assignment. It also aims to explore individual perceptions of the value of RJPs and RLCPs in contributing to work and general living adjustment.Design/methodology/approachThe paper draws on a qualitative study of international faculty in six Canadian universities using in‐depth interviews to examine their experiences of recruitment and focusing specifically on the extent to which RJPs and RLCP were provided.FindingsThe findings reflect the need for realistic recruitment that includes information about position specifications and responsibilities as well as non‐organizational factors such as opportunities for spousal employment. Thus, respondents did not conceptualize the recruitment process in terms of two separate components of “job” (RJP) and “living conditions” (RLCP). Instead realistic recruitment emerged as a holistic process, with each individual having his/her own differential weighting of the relative importance of different factors.Research limitations/implicationsThe sample comprises mostly white‐western faculty, thus ethnic minority faculty are underrepresented. Further research might also explore the perceptions and experiences of international recruiters.Originality/valueThe paper extends the current literature on RJPs and RLCPs to consider internationally mobile knowledge workers who elect to go overseas independently. Located within an interpretive perspective it also enhances our understanding of individual experiences and the need for a more holistic approach to international recruitment.

Mothers of young children cluster into 4 groups based on psychographic food decision influencers

This study explored how mothers grouped into clusters according to multiple psychographic food decision influencers and how the clusters differed in nutrient intake and nutrient content of their household food supply. Mothers (n = 201) completed a survey assessing basic demographic characteristics, food shopping and meal preparation activities, self and spouse employment, exposure to formal food or nutrition education, education level and occupation, weight status, nutrition and food preparation knowledge and skill, family member health and nutrition status, food decision influencer constructs, and dietary intake. In addition, an in-home inventory of 100 participants' household food supplies was conducted. Four distinct clusters presented when 26 psychographic food choice influencers were evaluated. These clusters appear to be valid and robust classifications of mothers in that they discriminated well on the psychographic variables used to construct the clusters as well as numerous other variables not used in the cluster analysis. In addition, the clusters appear to transcend demographic variables that often segment audiences (eg, race, mother's age, socioeconomic status), thereby adding a new dimension to the way in which this audience can be characterized. Furthermore, psychographically defined clusters predicted dietary quality. This study demonstrates that mothers are not a homogenous group and need to have their unique characteristics taken into consideration when designing strategies to promote health. These results can help health practitioners better understand factors affecting food decisions and tailor interventions to better meet the needs of mothers.

Military Spouse Employment

This study responds to the recognition that the majority of military spouses have paid employment but that neither the Department of Defense nor other organizations understand their motivations for work or their perceptions of how the military lifestyle has affected their employment. This article summarizes the input from more than a thousand military spouses who participated in interviews for this research. Qualitative and quantitative methods were used to examine spouse experiences and perceptions regarding their employment. Findings indicate that the majority of military spouses believe that the military has a negative effect on their employment. In addition, the interviews revealed that these spouses work for a variety of reasons, both financial and nonpecuniary. The reasons for the military's negative effect and spouse motives for working are discussed, along with the ensuing implications for policy.

Modelling the Employment and Wage Outcomes of Spouses: Is She Outearning Him?

Modelling the Employment and Wage Outcomes of Spouses: Is She Outearning Him?

Employment‐contingent health insurance, illness, and labor supply of women: evidence from married women with breast cancer

We examine the effects of employment-contingent health insurance (ECHI) on married women's labor supply following a health shock. First, we develop a theoretical framework that examines the effects of ECHI on the labor supply response to a health shock, which suggests that women with ECHI are less likely to reduce their labor supply in response to a health shock, relative to women with health insurance through their spouse's employer. Second, we empirically examine this relationship based on labor supply responses to breast cancer. We find that health shocks decrease labor supply to a greater extent among women insured by their spouse's policy than among women with health insurance through their own employer, suggesting that ECHI creates incentives to remain working when faced with a serious illness.

Households’ precautionary behaviors—the effects of the introduction of National Health Insurance in Taiwan

By reducing risk of large out-of-pocket medical expenses, comprehensive social health insurance may reduce households’ motivation to engage in precautionary behaviors such as saving, procurement of private insurance, and spousal labor-force participation. We use the natural experiment provided by the 1995 introduction of National Health Insurance in Taiwan to examine these effects, using pre-existing differences in access to health insurance (tied to the household head’s and spouse’s joint employment status) to identify the effects of increasing insurance coverage. We find that comprehensive health insurance has a statistically significant and large effect on household savings, but no significant effects on purchase of private accident insurance and spousal employment.

What makes 'place' attractive to overseas-trained doctors in rural New Zealand?

The present paper investigates what keeps doctors 'in place' in New Zealand rural communities and what prompts their departure from practice. The study is based on in-depth interviews conducted with nine overseas-trained medical practitioners within rural areas in New Zealand during 2004. A thematic analysis was undertaken. The resulting narratives reveal the unintended circumstances under which respondents often arrived in their rural communities, as well as some of the 'pull' factors which a more relaxed rural lifestyle offers. Recurring themes relating to the attractiveness of place include community loyalty and the enjoyment of 'fully practicing medicine'. Themes which corroded the attractiveness of place included 'entrapment', lack of choice in secondary schooling, restricted spousal employment opportunities, the lack of cultural and entertainment activities, and difficulties accessing continuing medical education. The authors conclude that addressing the question of what makes 'place' attractive to overseas-trained general practitioners in rural New Zealand requires an understanding of place as context rather than mere location.