Child care availability, quality and affordability: Are local problems related to maternal labour supply?

We examine whether subjective responses to survey questions about child care
availability, quality, and cost, aggregated at the local geographical level, have
any explanatory power in models of workforce participation and labour supply.
We find that married women who live in areas with more reports of lack of
availability, low quality, or costly childcare work less than women in areas with
fewer reported difficulties with child care. We find this effect on both the hours
of labour supplied and on the part‐time/full‐time choice. We find almost no
effects for lone parents