Overview

Abstract (English)

I investigate the effect of maternity and parental leave-related policy changes around 2000 in Canada on various child health and developmental outcomes. The study sample I investigate consists of working biological mothers in heterosexual two-parent families who had childbirths between 1998 and 2004 from the National Longitudinal Survey of Child and Youth (NLSCY). The reform is found to have a significant impact on the length of leave taken and the duration of breastfeeding. However, the reform is also found to have negative effects on the presence of chronic conditions in the child, child temperament outcomes, and child developmental milestones. The evidence regarding child developmental outcomes is mixed: results suggest that the length of leave taken has a positive impact on “behavioural-oriented” measures such as aggression measures, while the length of leave is observed to have a negative impact on “cognitive-oriented” measures such as Peabody Picture Vocabulary Test scores. Lastly, estimated effects for an indication of mothers returning to work prior to the child becoming 6 months old report contrary (i.e., opposite signs) to other maternity leave measures, suggesting that either the length of leave effect may be nonlinear or quadratic, or that there may be unobserved factors/variables not available in the NLSCY that may explain the disparate effect of short leave taking.

Abstract (French)

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