The Impact of Unpaid Labor on Women's Mental Health
Mental health is an important indicator for measuring human capital,as well as a livelihood and social issue that has attracted much attention from the country and government.For a long time,women have been the main bearers of household chores and child care,and their participation in unpaid household labor is much longer than that of men,which may affect their mental health level.The article is based on the Grossman's demand for health theory and uses the 2020 survey data from the China Family Panel Studies(CFPS)to empirically test the impact and transmission mechanism of unpaid labor on women's mental health.The results finds that an increase in household chores has a significant negative impact on women's mental health,while an increase in childcare time,although having a negative impact on women's mental health,is not significant.Heterogeneity analysis shows that household chores have a more significant negative impact on the mental health level of rural women,young women,and women with higher education levels,while childcare time has a more significant negative impact on the mental health level of elderly women and uneducated women.Robustness analysis shows that after controlling for endogeneity,the negative impact of household chores and childcare time on women's mental health is significantly enhanced.The analysis of the transmission mechanism indicates that unpaid labor mainly affects women's mental health by influencing their labor market performance.With the increase of unpaid working hours,women tend to choose informal employment,and their salary income also decreases,which has a negative impact on their mental health level.Therefore,valuing the value of unpaid labor,introducing family-friendly measures in the workplace,and advocating for men and women to share household labor are important measures to improve the mental health level of women in China.
unpaid laborhousehold chorechild carewomen's mental health
国家科技期刊平台
NSTL
万方数据
