Economic analysis of the labor supply of married women has long emphasized the impact of the unemployment of husbands—the added worker effect. This article re-examines the magnitude of the added worker effect in the waning years of the Great Depression. Previous studies of the labor supply of married women during this period failed to take account of various institutional features of New Deal work relief programs, which reduced the size of the added worker effect.
A Structural Model of Child Care and the Labor Supply of Married Women