Decomposing the determinants of fathers’ parental leave use: Evidence from migration between Finland and Sweden

Abstract

The use of parental leave by fathers varies notably between countries. However, the underlying reasons for cross-country differences have not been explicitly studied. We use migration between Finland and Sweden as an instrument to decompose the roles of policy design and social norms in the differences in take-up rates between these two countries. First, we inferred the role of policy by looking at fathers from the same country of origin in various policy contexts. Second, we deduced the role of norms by examining fathers who migrated at different ages and fathers with spouses of different origins. We find that the large cross-country differences in fathers’ use of parental leave between Finland and Sweden mainly stem from differences in policy design. Norms seem to play a smaller but still significant role.