The Macroeconomics of Child Labor Regulation
- 1 November 2005
- journal article
- Published by American Economic Association in American Economic Review
- Vol. 95 (5) , 1492-1524
- https://doi.org/10.1257/000282805775014425
Abstract
We develop a positive theory of the adoption of child labor laws. Workers who compete with children in the labor market support a child labor ban, unless their own working children provide a large fraction of family income. Fertility decisions lock agents into specific political preferences, and multiple steady states can arise. The introduction of child labor laws can be triggered by skill-biased technological change, which induces parents to choose smaller families. The theory can account for the observation that, in Britain, regulations were first introduced after a period of rising wage inequality, and coincided with rapid fertility decline.Keywords
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