Having children contributes to gender wage inequality. Prior research has shown that the impact of parenthood on mothers' and fathers' wages vary by their level of skills and earnings, but the underlying patterns and mechanisms are not well understood. This project investigates how the consequences of parenthood vary between socioeconomic groups and genders in Finland and the Nordic countries. We relate the skill- and earnings-gradient in parental wage effects to family policies and workplaces. We ask whether reforms extending fathers' leave entitlements increase or decrease selectivity in men's uptake of leave and thereby alter wage inequality between mothers and across households. We also examine how workplaces shape parental wage inequality. Empirically, we use Finnish, Swedish, Norwegian, and Danish register data, and advanced methods for hierarchical data. The results support policy makers in developing tools to strengthen equality within and between groups of men and women.

2022

2025