Titelaufnahme

This study identifies a new mechanism to account for the persistent gender differences in earnings after childbirth. Aside from women's voluntary wage cuts in pursuit of familyfriendly job amenities, we claim that adverse labor market conditions at the time of childbearing widen the gender gap among parents. Employing the instrumental variable (IV) method against a large cross-sectional dataset from the US, we find that giving birth during a recession reduces mothers' earnings, whereas fathers remain mostly unaffected. The asymmetric impact of a recession at the time of childbirth persists for a long time and accounts for 30–40 percent of the after-childbirth gender gap in earnings. Unintended impacts of recession on parenthood gender gap leaves room for government intervention on women’s career breaks.