Child Labor Legislation: Eective, Benign, Both or Neither?

SSRN Electronic Journal, 2000

We develop a positive theory of the adoption of child labor laws.

International Economic Review, 2005

This article studies the effects of child labor legislation on human capital accumulation and the distribution of wealth and welfare. We calibrate our model to U.S. data circa 1880 and find that the consequences of restricting child labor or providing tax-financed education depend on the main source of individual household income. Households with significant financial assets unambiguously lose from government intervention, whereas high-wage workers benefit most from a child labor ban, and low-wage workers benefit most from free education. Introducing free education results in substantial welfare gains, whereas a child labor ban induces small welfare losses. * Manuscript

2006

Origins and Consequences of Child Labour Restrictions: A Macroeconomic Perspective* In this paper we investigate the positive and normative consequences of childlabour restrictions for economic aggregates and welfare. We argue that even though the laissez-faire equilibrium may be inefficient, there are usually better policies to cure these inefficiencies than the imposition of a child-labour ban. Given this finding, we investigate the potential political-economic reasons behind the emergence and persistence of child-labour legislation. Our investigation is based on a structural dynamic general equilibrium model that provides a coherent and uniform framework for our analysis.

Cliometrica, 2011

Research in Labor Economics, 2010

SSRN Electronic Journal, 2000

This paper constructs a dynamic heterogeneous agent general equilibrium model to quantify the effects of child labor laws on human capital accumulation and the distribution of welfare. We find that the welfare consequences of a policy reform for agents depend crucially on the main source of household income. Households with large asset holdings would never support government intervention. High-wage workers benefit most from a ban on child labor, while low-wage workers benefit most from mandatory education. Utilitarian social welfare increases to a greater extent with mandatory, publicly financed education than with a child labor ban or a combination of both policies.

Economics of Education Review, 2018

We explore the effects of a child labor regulation that changed the statutory minimum working age in Spain in 1980. In particular, the reform raised the minimum working age from 14 to 16, while the age for compulsory education remained at 14 until 1990. To study the effects of this change on the incentives to work or study, we consider the different alternatives available at age 14 to individuals born at various times of the year before and after the reform. Before the reform, individuals born at the beginning of the year were legally able to work before finishing compulsory education. We show that individuals born at the beginning of the year were more likely to complete both compulsory and post-compulsory education if they turned 14 after the reform. The increase in educational attainment translates into better labor market outcomes in adulthood only partially. Depending on the level of socioeconomic development of the region, we provide evidence of differential impacts of the reform on men and women and offer plausible explanations for these differences. To the best of our knowledge, this is the first paper that, apart from increases in educational attainment, also finds relevant effects on long-term labor market outcomes from child labor regulations that forbid teenager work. We show that this type of regulation can be a generator of economic development and point to the conditions required for this to be the case.

SSRN Electronic Journal, 2000

We develop a positive theory of the adoption of child-labor regulation. There are two key mechanisms at work in our model. First, parental decisions on family size interact with their preferences for child-labor regulation. Second, the supply of child labor affects skilled and unskilled wages. If policies are determined by majority voting, multiple steady states with different child-labor policies can exist. The model is consistent with international evidence on the incidence of child labor. In particular, it predicts a positive correlation between child labor, fertility, and inequality across countries of similar income per capita. The model also predicts that the political support for regulation should increase if a rising skill premium induces parents to choose smaller families. A calibration of the model shows that it can replicate features of the history of the U.K. in the 19th Century, when regulations were introduced after a period of rising wage inequality, and coincided with rapidly declining fertility and rising educational levels.

2002

This paper develops a positive theory of the adoption of child labor restrictions (CLR). The key mechanism in our model is an interaction between parental decisions on family size and their preferences for CLR. While parents with few children have little to gain from child labor and are therefore likely to favor CLR, parents with many working children would be expected to oppose CLR. Fertility decisions, in turn, are affected by existing and expected child-labor policies. If policies are determined by majority voting, the interaction between fertility decisions and political preferences can lead to multiple steady states with different child-labor policies. A switch from no regulation to CLR is possible if a rising skill premium induces parents to choose smaller families, which over time creates a majority in favor of CLR. Consistent with this explanation, the introduction of CLR in the U.K. followed a period of rising wage inequality, and coincided with rapidly declining fertility and rising education levels.