Human capital, marital and birth timing, and the postnatal labor force participation of married women.

Using materials from the National Longitudinal Surveys of Labor Market Experience of Young Women, this article analyzes postnatal labor force participation data for married husband-present women over a 15-year period in order to study factors associated with the length of time out of the labor force following the 1st birth. Survival analyses and proportional hazards models indicate that human capital variables (education, prebirth work experience, and income) and marital and birth-timing variables (age at 1st marriage and age at 1st birth) have significant estimated effects on the rate and timing of reentry into the paid labor force.