cite: Clark2019
author: Clark, S., Kabiru, C. W., Laszlo, S., & Muthuri, S.
year: 2019
title: The Impact of Childcare on Poor Urban Women’s Economic Empowerment in Africa
publisher: Demography
uri: https://doi.org/10.1007/s13524-019-00793-3
pubtype: article
discipline: sociology

country: Kenya
period: 2015-2016
maxlength: 12
targeting: explicit
group: mothers
data: national administrative survey Nairobi Urban Health and Demographic Surveillance System

design: experimental
method: RCT
sample: 738
unit: individual
representativeness: subnational, urban
causal: 1 # 0 correlation / 1 causal

theory: economic empowerment theory
limitations: results restricted to 1 year; relatively high attrition rate
observation:
  - intervention: subsidy (childcare)
    institutional: 0
    structural: 1
    agency: 0
    inequality: gender
    type: 1 # 0 vertical / 1 horizontal
    indicator: 1 # 0 absolute / 1 relative
    measures: employment probability difference
    findings: subsidy increased employment probability (8.5ppts) for poor married mothers
    channels: increased ability to work through lower childcare burden
    direction: 1
    significance: 2 # 0 nsg / 1 msg / 2 sg
  - intervention: subsidy (childcare)
    institutional: 0
    structural: 1
    agency: 0
    inequality: gender
    type: 1 # 0 vertical / 1 horizontal
    indicator: 0 # 0 absolute / 1 relative
    measures: hours worked
    findings: subsidy decreased hours worked without decreasing income for single mothers
    channels: allows shifting to jobs with more regular hours
    direction: -1 # -1 neg
    significance: 2 # 0 nsg / 1 msg / 2 sg

notes:
annotation: |
  An experimental study on the impacts of providing childcare vouchers to poor women in urban Kenya, estimating the impacts on their economic empowerment.
  The empowerment is measured through disaggregated analyses of maternal income, employment probability and hours worked.
  It finds that, for married mothers there was a significantly positive effect on employment probability and hours worked, suggesting their increased ability to work through lower childcare costs increasing personal agency.
  For single mothers, it finds a negative effect on hours worked, though with a stable income.
  The authors suggest this is due to single Kenyan mothers already working increased hours compared to married mothers, though the effect shows the ability of single mothers to shift to jobs with more regular hours, even if they are not compatible with childcare.
  Minor limitations of the study are its restriction to effects within a period of 1 year, and a somewhat significant attrition rate to the endline survey.