Abstract
In the Netherlands, the previous pattern of most women withdrawing from the labour force after marriage has changed: it is now quite usual for women to work until they have their first child. One statistical consequence of this change is a remarkable increase in the labor force participation rate of young married women. However, it is quite possible that the length of the women's first stay on the labour market at the end of the seventies was about the same as twenty years before.
Relatively few women leave the labour force in the first five years after school; after that, however, a mass exodus starts. The Labour Force Sample Survey supplies data which can describe this process. Statistics on flows and durations give a clearer picture of labour force participation than the current participation rates.
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