Economic subjects | Social insurance » Hamish-Costas-Luigi - Marriage, Social Insurance and Labor Supply

Source: http://www.doksinet Marriage, Social Insurance and Labor Supply Hamish Low† Costas Meghir‡ ∗ Luigi Pistaferri§ Alessandra Voena¶ December 31, 2016 Abstract This paper develops a dynamic model of marriage, labor supply, welfare participation, savings and divorce under limited commitment and uses it to understand the impact of welfare reforms, particularly the time-limited eligibility, as in the TANF program. In the model, welfare programs can affect whether marriage and divorce take place, the extent to which people work as single or as married individuals, as well as the allocation of resources within marriage. The model thus provides a framework for estimating not only the short-term effects of welfare reforms on labor supply, but also the extent to which welfare benefits affect family formation and the way that transfers are allocated within the family. This is particularly important because many of these benefits are ultimately designed to support the

well-being ∗ We thank Orazio Attanasio, Mariacristina De Nardi and participants in seminars and conferences for helpful comments. Jorge Rodriguez Osorio, Samuel Seo and Davide Malacrino provided excellent research assistance. † University of Cambridge. ‡ Yale University, NBER and IFS. § Stanford University and NBER. ¶ The University of Chicago and NBER (email: avoena@uchicago.edu) 1 Source: http://www.doksinet of mothers and children. The limited commitment framework in our model allows us to capture the effects on existing marriages as well as marriages that will form after the reform has taken place, offering a better understanding of transitional impacts as well as longer run effects. Using variation provided by the introduction of time limits in welfare benefits eligibility following the Personal Responsibility and Work Opportunity Act of 1996 (welfare reform) and data from the Survey of Income and Program Participation between 1985 and 2011, we provide reduced form

evidence of the importance of these reforms on a number of outcomes relevant to our model. We then estimate the parameters of the model using the same source of data. 1 Introduction Welfare programs constitute an important source of insurance, particularly in a world with incomplete markets, where people have little protection against income and employment shocks. If carefully targeted and designed to minimize work disincentives they can increase overall welfare However, if the potential disincentives are not taken into account they can distort family formation and work decisions with far reaching consequences. These issues have been the source of continuous debate and underlie the major welfare reform of 1996. The key innovation of the Personal Responsibility and Work Opportunity Act of 1996 (PRWORA) was to introduce life cycle time limits on receipt of welfare benefits as well as reduce or remove marital disincentives implicitly built in to the preceding program, the Aid for

Families with Dependent Children, while increasing the relative importance of in-work benefits 2 Source: http://www.doksinet through the Earned Income Tax Credit (EITC). Understanding the tradeoff between incentives and insurance for such programs and their broader effects both in the short run and the long run is a central motivation of this paper. The PRWORA of 1996 gave the states greater latitude in setting their own parameters for welfare. However, the length of period over which federal government funds (in the form of block grants) could be used to provide assistance to needy families was limited to sixty months. States could set longer limits but would have to cover the financial obligations with their own state funds. About one-third of states adopted shorter time limits The result was that the new program varied from state to state, with the number of years that it would be available for any one individual being set in a decentralized way. Indeed Arizona just moved to a

new limit of just one year1 , while some states have imposed no limits. In addition, the new program removed the requirement of being single to be eligible for benefits, as was the case in some states under AFDC, thus seeking to reduce the disincentives to marry. Our aim is to understand how this set of reforms affected women over their life cycles. We recognize that the immediate effects may differ from those in the long run because people who know the new institutional framework is in place at the start of their careers before they make work and family choices, can plan their life in a different way than those who are surprised by the changes, having made a number of prior decisions consistent with the previous institutional framework. We thus start by estimating the immediate impact of the reform on welfare participation, employment, asset accumulation and marital status. This serves the dual purpose of documenting the 1 New York Times May 20, 2016. 3 Source: http://www.doksinet

direct effects and showing that indeed the margins we are considering do respond to changes in the institutional setting, a premise that underlies our model. To estimate the immediate effects we use a difference-in-differences framework exploiting the fact that the new welfare rules varied by state and affected different demographic groups differently. For example, women whose youngest child is enough to 18 years old (when benefit eligibility terminates anyway) would have remained unaffected by the time limits, while women with younger kids may be affected, depending on the actions taken by their state. Based on this approach we show that welfare utilization declined quite dramatically and persistently, employment of women increased, while the flow of both marriages and divorces declined. Finally, assets increased, particularly at the lower end of the wealth distribution. The reduced form analysis can reliably document the impacts that occurred but cannot reveal the longer-run

dynamics of nor the rich underlying mechanisms through which policy changes take place. For this purpose we need to develop a model of female marital and labor supply choices, which can be used both for understanding the dynamics and the mediating factors and for counterfactual analysis, leading us to a better understanding of the tradeoffs involved in designing welfare programs. In the model we specify, marriage, divorce, labor supply and savings are endogenous choices. In an attempt to understand better how welfare reform can affect intrahousehold inequality both in the longer run and the short run we characterize intrahousehold allocations within a limited commitment framework in which the outside options of both the male and the female are key determinants of both the willingness to marry and the way resources 4 Source: http://www.doksinet are allocated within the household. Depending on the circumstances, the Pareto weight and hence the allocation of resources changes to

ensure that the marriage can continue (if at all possible). A key element of our approach is the budget constraint and how this is shaped by the welfare system. We model in some detail the budget constraint facing the household, accounting for the structure of the welfare system, including TANF and the Earned Income Tax credit (EITC). The full structure, including the budget constraint, allows us to understand the dynamics implied by the time limits and more generally to evaluate how the structure of welfare affects marriage, labor supply and the allocation of resources within the household. This latter point is important because it allows us to address the issue of inequality and how this is affected by policy. We estimate our model using the SIPP data from 1985-2008 using the method of simulated moments2 . We restrict our sample to women between the ages of 18 and 60 who are not college graduates and for whom the policy changes are directly pertinent. Our paper builds on existing

work relating both welfare reform and lifecycle behavior. The literature on the effects of welfare reform is large and contentious and would take too long to list here. Excellent overviews are featured in Blank (2002) and Grogger and Karoly (2005) Experimental studies have highlighted that time limits encourage households to limit benefit utilization to “bank” their future eligibility (Grogger and Michalopoulos, 2003) and more generally are associated with reduced welfare participation (Swann, 2005; Mazzolari and Ragusa, 2012). 2 See McFadden (1989) and Pakes and Pollard (1989) 5 Source: http://www.doksinet The literature on employment effects of welfare reform has primarily focused on the sample of single women (see, for instance, Keane and Wolpin (2010)). Recently, Chan (2013) indicates that time limits associated with welfare reform are an important driver of the increase of labor supply in this group. Kline and Tartari (forthcoming) examine both intensive and extensive

margin labor supply responses in the context of the Connecticut Jobs First program, which imposed time limits. Limited evidence on the overall effect of welfare reform on household formation and dissolution suggests that the reform was associated with a small decline in divorces, while no effect has been found for transitions into marriage (Bitler et al., 2004) Our paper draws from the literature on dynamic career models such as Keane and Wolpin (1997) and subsequent models that allow for savings and labor supply in a family context such as Blundell et al. (2016) We build on this literature by endogenizing both marriage and divorce and allowing intra-household allocations to evolve depending on changes in the economic environment and preferences. The theoretical underpinnings draw from Chiappori (1988, 1992) and Blundell, Chiappori and Meghir (2005) and its dynamic extension by Mazzocco (2007b) We apply the risk sharing framework with limited commitment of Ligon, Thomas and Worrall

(2000) and Ligon, Thomas and Worrall (2002b) as extended to the lifecycle marriage model by Voena (2015).3 Thus we specify a framework that allows us to analyze the 3 Our paper also relates to the life cycle analyses of female labor supply and marital status (Attanasio, Low and Sanchez-Marcos, 2008; Fernández and Wong, 2014; Blundell et al., 2016) and contributes to existing work on taxes and welfare in a static context including Heckman (1974), Burtless and Hausman (1978), Keane and Moffitt (1998), Eissa and Liebman (1995) for the US as well as Blundell, Duncan and Meghir (1998) for the UK and many others. 6 Source: http://www.doksinet way that policy can affect key lifecycle decisions, including marriage, divorce, savings and labor supply.4 To summarize, our paper offers a number of innovations. First, this is the first model to endogenize marriage and divorce and to model intrahousehold allocations in a limited commitment framework, allowing for savings and subject to search

frictions. Second, we do this while taking into account the detailed structure of welfare benefits. Third, we use the short run effects of the reform to validate our model. Finally, we are able to use our model to estimate the welfare effects of the program and to perform counterfactual analysis. In what follows we present the data and the reduced form analysis of the effects of the time limits component of the PRWORA. We then discuss our model, followed by estimation, analysis of the implications and counterfactual policy simulations. We end with concluding remarks 2 The Data and Empirical Evidence on the Effects of Time Limits We use waves of the Survey of Income and Program Participation span- ning the 1985-2008 period.5 We restrict the sample to individuals between 18 and 60 years old with at least one child under age 19, and who are not college graduates. We keep only the 4th monthly observations for each individual 4 See Persson (2014) for an example of how policy can

directly affect household formation. 5 We use wave 1985, 1986, 1987, 1988, 1990, 1991, 1992, 1993, 1996, 2001, 2004 and 2008. 7 Source: http://www.doksinet Table 1: Summary statistics Variable Welfare participation Welfare participation (married) Welfare participation (unmarried) Employed Employed (married) Employed (unmarried) Divorced or separated Gets divorced or separated Married Gets married Positive assets Assets Positive liquid assets Liquid assets Age T reat ∗ P ost Age of youngest child Number of children Age White Disabled Obs Mean Std. Dev 406,370 0.067 0.250 286,425 0.024 0.152 119,945 0.170 0.375 455,514 0.636 0.481 287,528 0.636 0.481 167,986 0.636 0.481 455,514 0.158 0.364 455,514 0.032 0.175 455,514 0.631 0.482 455,514 0.102 0.302 70,689 0.766 0.423 70,689 38724 101969 70,689 0.466 0.499 70,689 10835 72678 455,514 35.260 9.366 455,514 0.397 0.489 455,514 7.692 5.591 455,514 1.981 1.085 455,514 35.260 9.366 455,514 0.783 0.413 455,514 0.113 0.316 Notes: Data from

the 1990-2008 SIPP panels. Sample of households in which the head is not a college graduate and which have children below the age of 19. Table 1 summarizes the data. Women in our sample are on average 35 years old. The program participation rate (AFDC/TANF), which is overall 7% in this population, is only 2.4% for married heads of household and jumps to 17% for unmarried heads. There is a 1% annual divorce rate and 2% annual marriage rate. The employment rate for married and unmarried women is about the same at 63%. 8 Source: http://www.doksinet Finally, it is noteworthy that the asset holdings in this population are not negligible, with the average being $39,000, of which $10,500 are liquid assets. The shares of our sample with positive assets and liquid assets are 77% and 47%, respectively. Since assets are an important source of self insurance, it is critical to take into account their presence: in the presence of time limits, people may decide to use their own assets to smooth

out large negative income shocks, rather than exhaust their benefits eligibility upfront. Finally, in evaluating the welfare effects of the reforms, it is important to take precautionary savings into account. We exploit a simple strategy to examine the relationship between the introduction of time limits through welfare reform and our outcome variables of interest: welfare benefits utilization, female employment, marital status and liquid assets holdings. 2.1 Empirical strategy The basic idea behind our descriptive empirical strategy is to compare households that, based on their demographic characteristics and their state of residence, could have been affected by time limits to households that were not affected, before and after time limits were introduced. This strategy extends prior work about time limits and benefits utilization (Grogger and Michalopoulos, 2003) to cross-state variation. We define a variable T reat which takes value 0 if the household’s expected benefits have

not changed as a result of the reform, assuming the household has never used benefits before. T reat takes value 1 if a household’s benefits (in terms of eligibility or amounts) have been affected in any way by the 9 Source: http://www.doksinet reform. Hence, T reat is a function of the demographic characteristics of a household and the rules of the state the household resides. For example, if a households’s youngest child is aged 13 or above in year t and the state’s lifetime limit is 60 months, the variable T reat takes value 0, while if a households’s youngest child is aged 12 or below in year t and the state’s lifetime limit is 60 months, the variable T reat takes value 1. Also, if a households’s youngest child is aged 13 in year t and the state has an intermittent limit of 24 months every 60, the variable T reat takes value 1. Lastly, if a households’s youngest child is aged 16 in year t and the state’s time limit is an intermittent limit of 24 months every 60

months, the variable T reat takes value 0, because the household would be eligible for at most 24 months both pre- and post-reform. The estimation equation for household i with demographics d (age of the youngest child) in state s at time t takes the form: yidst = αT reatds P ostst + β 0 Xidst + f est + f eds + f es + f et + f ed + idst where P ostst equals 1 if state s has enacted the reform at time t and 0 otherwise. We include state, year and demographic (age of the youngest child) fixed effects, as well as state by time fixed effects to account for differential trends and state by demographic fixed effects to allow for heterogeneity across states in the way demographic groups behave. That is, this exercise can be seen as a difference-in-differences one that compares demographic groups before and after welfare reform. Figure 1 illustrates the definition of the variable T reat. The horizontal axis represents the age of the youngest child in the household. The vertical 10 Source:

http://www.doksinet axis represents the number of years of potential benefits the household can claim. The blue solid line (Pre-reform) indicates that the before the reform the household can claim benefits for as many years as the difference between 18 and the age of the youngest child. Post-reform, Michigan maintain a similar regime. The variable T reat is equal to 0 whenever the line representing the regime the household is exposed to equals the pre-reform line, and 1 otherwise. Years of potential support 6 8 10 12 14 16 18 Figure 1: Time limits and the definition of treatment Pre-reform Michigan, post-reform 4 Illinois 2 Ohio 0 Massachussets 0 2 4 6 8 10 12 Age youngest child 11 14 16 18 Source: http://www.doksinet The variable P ostst is constructed based on the timing of the introduction of time limits reported in Mazzolari and Ragusa (2012). To study the relationship between time limits and outcome variables over time, we allow the variable T reatds to

interact differently with each calendar year between the reform and 2011. Moreover, we estimate pre-reform interactions for 1992 and 1995 to rule out pre-reform trends across demographic groups. yidst = 2011 X ατ T reatds 1{t = τ }t +β 0 Xidst +f est +f eds +f es +f et +f ed +idst . τ =1992 2.2 2.21 Results Benefits utilization We start by examining changes in the utilization of AFDC and of TANF. On average, in our sample, 7% of households are claiming benefits (Table 1); among households headed by an unmarried person, the rate is close to 17%. Households that are likely to be affected by the welfare reform based on the age of their youngest child have a 5 percentage points lower probability of claiming benefits after the introduction of time limits (Table 2, columns 1 and 2). Treated households headed by an unmarried person have 15 percentage points lower probability of claiming welfare benefits after welfare reform, while those headed by a married head have 2 percentage

points lower probability of claiming such benefits. Examining how treatment interacts with year dummies, we notice that the utilization rate among treated households begins to significantly decline 12 Source: http://www.doksinet in 1998, down to a permanent drop of 6 percentage points by 1999 (figure 3, panel A). It hence appears to be the case that households reduce their benefits utilization before 5 years from the reform, and hence before running out of their benefit eligibility. Similar time patterns are observed among the marital status subgroups. .05 -.2 -.06 -.15 -.04 Coefficient -.02 Coefficient -.1 -.05 0 0 .02 Figure 2: Program participation dynamics in the short run 1993 1995 1997 Year 1999 2001 1993 1995 1999 2001 (b) Unmarried head -.03 -.02 Coefficient -.01 0 .01 (a) Everyone 1997 Year 1993 1995 1997 Year 1999 2001 (c) Married head Notes: Data from the 1990-2008 SIPP panels, years 1990-2001. Sample of households in which the head is not

a college graduate with at least a child below age 19. The full set of controls includes age dummies, education dummies, number of children dummies, year-bymonth fixed effects, state fixed effects, demographics fixed effects, state-by-demographics fixed effects, state-by-year fixed effects, race and disability status. 13 Source: http://www.doksinet -.3 -.08 -.06 -.2 Coefficient -.1 Coefficient -.04 -.02 0 0 .1 .02 Figure 3: Program participation dynamics in the long run 1993 1995 1997 1999 2001 2003 Year 2005 2007 2009 2011 1993 1997 1999 2001 2003 Year 2005 2007 2009 2011 (b) Unmarried head -.04 -.02 Coefficient 0 .02 (a) Everyone 1995 1993 1995 1997 1999 2001 2003 Year 2005 2007 2009 2011 (c) Married head Notes: Data from the 1990-2008 SIPP panels. Sample of households in which the head is not a college graduate with at least a child below age 19. The full set of controls includes age dummies, education dummies, number of children

dummies, year-by-month fixed effects, state fixed effects, demographics fixed effects, state-by-demographics fixed effects, state-by-year fixed effects, race and disability status. To verify this intuition, we re-define the annual treatment dummies as T reateddst 1{τ years since T L}st , hence counting the number of years since the official introduction of time limits in each state. We do this execs on the overall sample and on the sample that excludes states with shorter time limits. The goal is to verify whether the decline in welfare utilization takes 14 Source: http://www.doksinet place before household may have reasonable exhausted their eligibility. As shown in figure , the fraction of household claiming benefits declines after the first year since the introduction of time limits, suggesting that foresight is a key driver of the reduction in welfare utilization. .05 -.08 -.1 -.06 -.05 Coefficient Coefficient -.04 -.02 0 0 .02 Figure 4: Program participation

dynamics relative to the introduction of time limits -5 -4 -3 -2 -1 0 1 2 3 4 5 6 Time 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 -5 -4 -3 -2 -1 0 (a) Everyone 1 2 3 4 5 6 Time 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 (b) States with limit above 24 months Notes: Data from the 1990-2008 SIPP panels. Sample of households in which the head is not a college graduate with at least a child below age 19. The full set of controls includes age dummies, education dummies, number of children dummies, year-by-month fixed effects, state fixed effects, demographics fixed effects, state-by-demographics fixed effects, state-by-year fixed effects, race and disability status. 2.22 Employment The introduction of time limits is associated with a 3 percentage points (pp) increase in the employment probability of women, while the sample average employment rate is 63%. The result is driven by an 8 pp point increase in the employment of unmarried women. (table 3) 15 (2) AFDC/ TANF (3) AFDC/ TANF married (4) AFDC/

TANF married (5) AFDC/ TANF unmarried 16 -0.154* (0.00935) Yes Yes Yes Yes 119,945 0.196 (6) AFDC/ TANF unmarried Notes: Data from the 1990-2008 SIPP panels. Sample of households in which the head is not a college graduate with at least a child below age 19. The full set of controls includes age dummies, education dummies, number of children dummies, year-by-month fixed effects, state fixed effects, demographics fixed effects, state-by-demographics fixed effects, state-by-year fixed effects. Standard errors in parentheses, clustered at the state level -0.0504* -0.0502* -0.0180* -0.0177* -0.157* (0.00284) (0.00275) (0.00243) (0.00234) (0.0102) Basic controls Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Race No Yes No Yes No Disability status No Yes No Yes No Unemp. rate*Demog. No Yes No Yes No Observations 406,370 406,370 286,425 286,425 119,945 R-squared 0.070 0.108 0.043 0.058 0.172 Standard errors in parentheses clustered at the state level * p<0.01, * p<0.05, * p<0.1 T reatdst P ostst

VARIABLES (1) AFDC/ TANF Table 2: Benefits utilization Source: http://www.doksinet (2) employed (3) employed married (4) employed married 17 0.0800* (0.00855) Yes No No No 167,986 0.080 level (5) employed unmarried 0.0716* (0.00788) Yes Yes Yes Yes 167,986 0.168 (6) employed unmarried Notes: Data from the 1990-2008 SIPP panels. Sample of non-college graduates with at least a child below age 19 The full set of controls includes age dummies, education dummies, number of children dummies, year-by-month fixed effects, state fixed effects, demographics fixed effects, state-by-demographics fixed effects, state-by-year fixed effects. Standard errors in parentheses, clustered at the state level. 0.0328* 0.0294* 0.00318 0.00187 (0.00596) (000531) (000717) (000652) Basic controls Yes Yes Yes Yes Race No Yes No Yes Disability status No Yes No Yes Unemp. rate*Demog. No Yes No Yes Observations 455,514 455,514 287,528 287,528 R-squared 0.058 0.104 0.055 0.084 Standard errors in

parentheses clustered at the state * p<0.01, * p<0.05, * p<0.1 T reatdst P ostst VARIABLES (1) employed Table 3: Employment status - Women Source: http://www.doksinet Source: http://www.doksinet .15 -.05 -.02 0 0 Coefficient .05 Coefficient .02 .04 .1 .06 .08 Figure 5: Employment probability dynamics in the short run 1993 1995 1997 Year 1999 2001 1993 1995 1999 2001 (b) Unmarried women -.04 -.02 Coefficient 0 .02 .04 .06 (a) All women 1997 Year 1993 1995 1997 Year 1999 2001 (c) Married women Notes: Data from the 1990-2008 SIPP panels, years 1990-2001. Sample of non-college graduates with at least a child below age 19. The full set of controls includes age dummies, education dummies, number of children dummies, year-by-month fixed effects, state fixed effects, demographics fixed effects, state-by-demographics fixed effects, state-by-year fixed effects, race and disability status. 18 Source: http://www.doksinet Coefficient .05 -.05

-.02 0 0 Coefficient .02 .04 .1 .06 .08 .15 Figure 6: Employment probability dynamics in the long run 1993 1995 1997 1999 2001 2003 Year 2005 2007 2009 2011 1993 1997 1999 2001 2003 Year 2005 2007 2009 2011 (b) Unmarried women -.05 0 Coefficient .05 .1 (a) All women 1995 1993 1995 1997 1999 2001 2003 Year 2005 2007 2009 2011 (c) Married women Notes: Data from the 1990-2008 SIPP panels. Sample of non-college graduates with at least a child below age 19. The full set of controls includes age dummies, education dummies, number of children dummies, year-by-month fixed effects, state fixed effects, demographics fixed effects, state-by-demographics fixed effects, state-by-year fixed effects, race and disability status. 2.23 Household formation and dissolution A central motivation for welfare reform was to encourage marriage. In studying this relationship, we first consider the impact of welfare reform on the probability of being divorced or

separated for women. Treated women 19 Source: http://www.doksinet are 3 percentage points less likely to be divorced after the introduction of time limits (table 4, columns 1 and 2). The decline is associated with a 0.2 percentage points decline in the probability of transitioning into divorce conditional on being married during the previous interview (Table 4, columns 3 and 4). Table 4: Divorce (1) (2) (3) (4) VARIABLES divorce/ divorce/ gets divorced/ gets divorced/ separation separation separated separated T reatdst P ostst -0.0271* -0.0260* -0.00439* -0.00402* (0.00601) (0.00573) (0.00115) (0.00118) Basic controls Yes Yes Yes Yes Race No Yes No Yes Disability status No Yes No Yes Unemp. rate*Demog. No Yes No Yes Observations 455,514 455,514 455,514 455,514 R-squared 0.023 0.030 0.068 0.069 Standard errors in parentheses clustered at the state level * p<0.01, * p<0.05, * p<0.1 Notes: Data from the 1990-2008 SIPP panels. Sample of non-college graduate women with at least

a child below age 19. The full set of controls includes age dummies, education dummies, number of children dummies, year-by-month fixed effects, state fixed effects, demographics fixed effects, state-by-demographics fixed effects, state-by-year fixed effects. Robust standard errors in parentheses. As shown in the first two columns of Table 5, there was also a 2 percentage points decline in the proportion married, related to a 0.3-04 pp point decline in those getting married each year as shown in the last two columns of the same table. Thus there seem to be more people staying together but at the same time 20 Source: http://www.doksinet fewer are getting married as a result of the reform. Table 5: Marriage VARIABLES (1) married (2) married (3) gets married (4) gets married T reatdst P ostst -0.0132* -0.0160* -0.00485* -0.00535* (0.00764) (000706) (0.00173) (0.00176) Basic controls Yes Yes Yes Yes Race No Yes No Yes Disability status No Yes No Yes Unemp. rate*Demog. No No Yes

Yes Observations 455,514 455,514 455,514 455,514 R-squared 0.152 0.208 0.357 0.360 Standard errors in parentheses clustered at the state level * p<0.01, * p<0.05, * p<0.1 Notes: Data from the 1990-2008 SIPP panels. Sample of non-college graduate women with at least a child below age 19. The full set of controls includes age dummies, education dummies, number of children dummies, year-by-month fixed effects, state fixed effects, demographics fixed effects, state-by-demographics fixed effects, state-by-year fixed effects. Robust standard errors in parentheses. 2.24 Assets holdings Overall assets show a decline which is not significant. However, when we split the sample into those married and those not we find a decline in asset holdings among those married, while unmarried women increase their asset holdings. Both effects are highly significant and even with a Bonferroni adjustment, they have a joint p-value of at most 2%. The result on single women has a straightforward

interpretation: the reduction in publicly provided insurance 21 Source: http://www.doksinet is replaced with increased savings, as self-insurance. The married couple effect is interesting: married couples find it harder to claim benefits, so they probably do not lose much by the reform. Moreover, the reform induced a decline in the divorce probability, leading to a lower demand for insurance. Importantly, there may be important selection out of marriage for poorer household, because of the changes in marital status documented above. It is these complex effects that the structural model we develop will seek to match and interpret. 22 (2) assets (3) assets married (4) assets married (5) assets unmarried 23 3,785 (2,304) Yes Yes Yes Yes 23,369 0.067 (6) assets unmarried The full set of controls includes age dummies, education dummies, number of children dummies, year-by-month fixed effects, state fixed effects, demographics fixed effects, state-by-demographics fixed effects,

state-by-year fixed effects. Robust standard errors in parentheses. par Notes: Data from the 1990-2008 SIPP panels. Sample of non-college graduate women with at least a child below age 19 -6,025* -6,486 -13,194 -13,374 4,305* (2,086) (2,109) (3,174) (3,275) (2,336) Basic controls Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Race No Yes No Yes No Disability status No Yes No Yes No Unemp. rate*Demog. No Yes No Yes No Observations 70,689 70,689 47,320 47,320 23,369 R-squared 0.053 0.069 0.061 0.072 0.053 Standard errors in parentheses clustered at the state level * p<0.01, * p<0.05, * p<0.1 T reatdst P ostst VARIABLES (1) assets Table 6: Assets holdings Source: http://www.doksinet Source: http://www.doksinet 2.25 Fertility Because our empirical strategy, in this section of the paper, relies on the age of the youngest child as a source of predetermined variation, it is not suited to examine contemporary changes in fertility outcomes, which directly affect the age of the youngest child. Hence,

to examine whether time limits influenced fertility outcomes, we focus on the probability that a household will have a newborn (a child below age 1) in the following year, with the specification newbornidst+1 = αT reatds P ostst +β 0 Xidst +f est +f eds +f es +f et +f ed +idst Table 8 report the results of estimating the above equation on the whole sample and on subsamples that depend on marital status. In no specification we find that exposure to time limits influences the probability of future births, nor for married, nor for unmarried women. 24 (2) liquid wealth (3) liquid wealth married (4) liquid wealth married 25 1,772 (1,755) Yes Yes Yes Yes 23,369 0.029 (6) liquid wealth unmarried The full set of controls includes age dummies, education dummies, number of children dummies, year-by-month fixed effects, state fixed effects, demographics fixed effects, state-by-demographics fixed effects, state-by-year fixed effects. Robust standard errors in parentheses. par Notes:

Data from the 1990-2008 SIPP panels. Sample of non-college graduate women with at least a child below age 19 1,968 (1,730) Yes No No No 23,369 0.026 level (5) liquid wealth unmarried -3,923* -4,191 -7,986 -8,098 (1,588) (1,690) (2,249) (2,346) Basic controls Yes Yes Yes Yes Race No Yes No Yes Disability status No Yes No Yes Unemp. rate*Demog. No Yes No Yes Observations 70,689 70,689 47,320 47,320 R-squared 0.019 0.024 0.025 0.029 Standard errors in parentheses clustered at the state * p<0.01, * p<0.05, * p<0.1 T reatdst P ostst VARIABLES (1) liquid wealth Table 7: Liquid assets holdings Source: http://www.doksinet 26 Yes No No No 66,879 0.021 0.00317 (0.00278) (5) newbornt+1 unmarried Yes Yes Yes Yes 66,879 0.021 0.00335 (0.00284) (6) newbornt+1 unmarried Notes: Data from the 1990-2008 SIPP panels. Sample of non-college graduates with at least a child below age 19 The full set of controls includes age dummies, education dummies, number of children dummies,

year-by-month fixed effects, state fixed effects, demographics fixed effects, state-by-demographics fixed effects, state-by-year fixed effects. Standard errors in parentheses, clustered at the state level. -0.000880 (0.00178) Yes Yes Yes Yes No Yes No Yes No Yes No Yes No Yes No Yes 233,944 233,944 167,065 167,065 0.010 0.010 0.014 0.014 Robust standard errors in parentheses * p<0.01, * p<0.05, * p<0.1 -0.000662 (0.00176) (4) newbornt+1 married Basic controls Race Disability status Unemp. rate*Demog. Observations R-squared -0.000894 (0.00129) (3) newbornt+1 married -0.000747 (0.00125) (2) newbornt+1 T reatdst P ostst VARIABLES (1) newbornt+1 Table 8: Fertility Source: http://www.doksinet Source: http://www.doksinet 2.3 2.31 Robustness checks Attrition in the SIPP sample To address concerns regarding the high rate of attrition in the SIPP (Zabel, 1998), we limit our analysis to the first two waves for each SIPP panel. In Appendix table 16 we show that this

adjustment leaves the results unaffected. 2.32 Exclude young children A potential concern is that our results are driven by changes in the behavior of households with small children after welfare reform as a result of the childcare provisions in the PRWORA. Appendix table 17 shows that the results are robust to excluding households in which the youngest child is below the age of 6. 3 The model The model, while taking into account the entire family structure, focuses primarily on the behavior of mothers, who can be single or married. Marriage and divorce are endogenous and take place at the start of the period. We begin by describing labor supply, savings and welfare participation choices that take place after the marital status decision. We then describe how marital status choices are made. 27 Source: http://www.doksinet 3.1 Problem of the single woman We start by describing the problem of a single woman who has completed schooling. 6 In each period, she decides whether to

work, whether to claim welfare and how much to save. W The vector of choice variables q t = {cW t , Pt , Bt } includes: how much W to consume (cW t ), whether she works (Pt ), and whether to claim welfare benefits bt (Bt ∈ {0, 1}) which depend on children and their age, income, assets and past utilization. In addition, she makes a choice to marry, which will depend on meeting a man and whether he will accept. The decision to marry takes place at the start of the period, before any consumption or work plan is implemented: the latter will be conditional on the marriage decision. If she remains single, her budget constraint is given by AW cW t+1 t = AW − + (wtW − CCta )PtW + Bt bt + F St + EIT Ct t 1+r e(kta ) (1) AW t+1 ≥ 0 where e(kta ) is the equivalence scale due to the presence of children and CCta is the financial cost of childcare paid if the woman works. Her wage wt is drawn from a distribution that depends on her age and the previous period wage. s The state space for

a single woman is ΩW = {At , wt , kta , T Bt }, where t T Bt is the number of time periods the woman has claimed the time limited 6 Our main focus in on low-education women, because we are interested in the impacts of means-tested welfare benefits, such as TANF. An important question is how education choice is itself affected by the presence of such benefits (Blundell et al., 2016) We leave this question for further research. Bronson (2014) studies women’s education decisions in a dynamic collective model of the household with limited commitment. 28 Source: http://www.doksinet benefit. The within-period preferences for a single woman are denoted by W uW s (cW t , Pt , Bt ). We model three social programs: food stamps, EITC and AFDC or TANF. The first two are represented by F St and EIT Ct respectively, while AFDC or TANF by bt Food stamps and EITC are functions of the vector {kta , wtW PtW , At , T Bt }, while AFDC/TANF is a function of the vector {kta , wtW PtW , At , T Bt

}. We discuss the parametrization of the various benefits programs, which interact in a complex way with one another, in the structural estimation section. With probability λt , at the begining of the period the woman meets a man with characteristics {Am , ytm } (assets and exogenous earning) and together they draw an initial match quality s0t . In that case, they decide whether to get married, as described below. Denote the distribution of available men in period t as G(A, y|t). We restrict encounters to be between a man and a woman of the same age group.7 s We denote by VtW s (ΩW t ) the value function for a single woman at age t m and VtW m (ΩW ) the value function for a married woman at age t, which we t will define below. A single woman has the following value functions:  Ws W W s u (ct , Pt , Bt ) VtW s (ΩW t ) = maxq t   s M Ws Ws Wm Ws +βEt λt+1 [(1 − Mt+1 (Ωt+1 ))Vt+1 (ΩW t+1 ) + Mt+1 (Ωt+1 )Vt+1 (Ωt+1 )] + (1 − λt+1 )Vt+1 (Ωt+1 ) 7 In principle,

this distribution is endogenous and as economic conditions change, the associated marriage market will change, with this “offer” distribution changing. In this paper we take this distribution as given and do not solve for it endogenously. This mainly affects counterfactual simulations. Note that solving for the equilibrium distribution in two dimensions is likely to be very complicated computationally. 29 Source: http://www.doksinet subject to the two constraints in (1). 3.2 Problem of the single man Men solve an analogous problem without welfare benefits and without a labor supply choice. Men’s earnings follow a stochastic process described by M , age). Children affect the man’s problem only the distribution f M (ytM |yt−1 when he is married to their mother. s These assumptions determine V M s (ΩM t ), the man’s value function when j he is single. VtM m (ΩM t ) the value accruing to a married man. In all cases Ωt is the relevant state space. His budget

constraint is given by AM t+1 M M = AM t − ct + yt + F St 1+r (2) AM t+1 ≥ 0. The problem for the single male is thus defined by s VtM s (ΩM t ) = maxcM t  Ms Ms uM s (cM t ) + βEt [λt+1 [(1 − Mt+1 (Ωt+1 ))Vt+1 (Ωt+1 ) Ms Mm Ms +Mt+1 (Ωt+1 )Vt+1 (ΩM t+1 )] + (1 − λt+1 )Vt+1 (Ωt+1 )] . The problem is more complex than the simple consumption smoothing and precautionary savings problem because assets affect the probability of marriage as well as the share of consumption when married. 30 Source: http://www.doksinet 3.3 Problem of the couple The state variables, summarized in Ωm t , are: assets, spouses’ productivity, number of periods of welfare benefits utilization, age of the child (if present) (kta ), the weight on each spouse’s utility θtH , θtW (Mazzocco, 2007a; Voena, 2015). Given the decision to continue being married the couple solves:  W Wm W W θt u (ct , Pt , Bt ) + θtM uM m (cM Vtm (Ωm t ) = maxq t t ) + st 
 Ws Ms m W Ws M Ms

+βEt (1 − Dt+1 (Ωt+1 ))Vt+1 (Ωm t+1 ) + Dt+1 (Ωt+1 ) θt Vt+1 (Ωt+1 ) + θt Vt+1 (Ωt+1 ) s.t At+1 1+r M a W a W M = At − x(cW t , ct , kt ) + (wt − CCt )Pt + yt + Bt + F St + EIT Ct bt At+1 ≥ 0 Ws Ws Wm (Ωm Vt+1 t+1 ) ≥ Vt+1 (Ωt+1 ) Ms Mm Ms Vt+1 (Ωm t+1 ) ≥ Vt+1 (Ωt+1 ) j M M M W + µW where θtW = θt−1 t and θt = θt−1 + µt , with µt for j = W, H rep- resenting the Lagrange multiplier on each spouse’s sequential participation m Mm Mm constraint. Also, Vt+1 (Ωm t+1 ), Vt+1 (Ωt+1 ) are defined recursively as each spouses’ value from being married in periond t + 1: J∗ Jm J∗ J∗ Jm , Bt+1 ) Vt+1 (Ωm (ct+1 , Pt+1 t+1 ) = u   Js Jm Js + βE (1 − Dt+1 (Ωt+2 ))Vt+2 (Ωm t+1 ) + Dt+2 (Ωt+2 )Vt+2 (Ωt+2 ) for J = W, M . Hence, the Pareto weights θtM and θtW are set to ensure that both each spouse wants to remain married at each point in time as long as there are 31 Source: http://www.doksinet transfers that can

support that. To capture economies of scale in marriage the individual consumptions a M cW t and ct and the children’s equivalence scale e(k ) imply an aggregate 1 household expenditure of xt = ρ M ρ ρ ((cW t ) +(ct ) ) e(ka ) . The extent of economies of scale is controlled by ρ and e(k a ). When married the Pareto weights remain unchanged so long as the participation constraint for each partner is satisfied. If the one partner’s participation constraint is not satisfied the Pareto weight moves the minimal amount needed to satisfy it. This is consistent with the dynamic contracting literature with limited commitment, such as Kocherlakota (1996) and Ligon, Thomas and Worrall (2002a). If it is not feasible to satisfy both spouses’ participation constraints and the intertemporal budget constraint for any allocation of resources, then divorce follows. In our context marriage is not a pure risk sharing contract. Marriage takes place because of complementarities, love and

possibly also because features of the tax and welfare system promote it. And indeed marriage can break down efficiently if the surplus becomes negative for all Pareto weights. However, when marriage is better than the single state, overall transfers will take place that will de facto lead to risk sharing, exactly because this is a way to ensure that the participation constraint is satisfied for both partners, when surplus is present. Suppose, for instance, the female wage drops relative to the male one; he may end up transferring resources because single life may have become relatively more attractive to her, say because of government transfers to individuals. 32 Source: http://www.doksinet 3.4 Marital status transitions 3.41 Marriage decision s Ms M Define Ωt = {ΩW t , Ωt , Ωt }, i.e the relevant state space for a couple who have met and on which the partnering decision will depend; this will depend on each person’s individual assets. At the start of the period a

woman may meet a man (with probability λt ). If this is the case they will marry if there exists a feasible allocation such that s s Ms Mm Ws (ΩM (ΩM (ΩW Mt (Ωt ) = 1{VtW m (ΩM t )} t ) > Vt t ) and Vt t ) > Vt Married couples share resources in an ex post efficient way solving an intertemporal Pareto problem subject to participation constraints. Following the existing literature, the Pareto weights at the time of marriage (θ1M for the husband, θ1W for the wife) equates the gains from marriage between spouses. This assumption implies solving for the value of θ t such that: VtW m (θtW ) − V1W s = V1M m (θtM ) − V1M s . Upon divorce, assets are divided equally upon separation - hence, there is no need to keep track of individual assets during marriage. Thus once married, spouses’ assets merge into one value: M At = AW t + At . We denote by ΩM t the state space for a married couple. 33 Source: http://www.doksinet 3.42 Divorce decision At the start of

the period, the couple decides whether to continue being married or whether to divorce. Divorce can take place unilaterally and is efficient, in the sense that if there is a positive surplus from remaining married, the appropriate transfers will take place. Thus divorce (Dt = 1) takes place if (and only if) the marital surplus is negative. Here this is equivalent to saying that there exists no feasible allocation and corresponding Pareto weights θt such that s s Ms Wm Ws VtM m (Ωm (ΩM (Ωm (ΩW t , θ t ) ≥ Vt t ) and Vt t , θ t ) ≥ Vt t ) where θ t is a vector of the two Pareto weights in period t discussed below. The value functions for being single are defined above and evaluated at the level of assets implied by the equal division of assets as defined in divorce law. Denote the value of marriage Vtm (Ωm t ). The vector of choice variables M W for those remaining married, is q t = {cW t , ct , Pt , Bt }. It includes: how W M much spouses consume (cW t and ct ),

whether the wife works (Pt ), whether the woman claims welfare benefits amounting to bt (Bt ∈ {0, 1}). 3.5 3.51 Exogenous processes Fertility In this version of the model, children arrive exogenously, given marital status. The conditional probability of having a child is taken to be P r(kt1 |Mt , t) The maximum number of children is 1. The probability depends on whether 34 Source: http://www.doksinet a male partner is present (M = 1) so in some sense fertility is endogenous through the marital decision. 3.52 Female wages and male earnings We estimate a wage process for the female and an earnings process for the male. Since we take female employment as endogenous we also need to control for selection. However, we simplify the overall estimation problem by estimating the income processes separately and outside the model. One interesting issue is the extent to which the reform affected the labor market and in particular human capital prices (Rothstein, 2010). Whether such

general equilibrium effects are important or not depends very much on the extent to which the skills of those affected by the welfare reforms are substitutable or otherwise with respect to the rest of the population. With reasonable amounts of substitutability we do not expect important general equilibrium effects. The earnings process for men and the wage process for women take the form M M M M 2 M M M ln(yitM ) = aM 0 + a1 aget + a2 + (aget ) + fi + zit + it W W W W W W W 2 ln(witW ) = aW 0 + a1 aget + a2 (aget ) + fi + zit + it M zitM = zi,t−1 + ζitM W zitW = zi,t−1 + ζitW . for j = H, M , zitj is permanent income, which evolves as a random walk following innovation ζitj , and jit is i.id measurement error 35 Source: http://www.doksinet 3.6 Timing At the beginning of each period, uncertainty is realized. People observe their productivity realization ytj and childless women learn whether they have a child. If single, people meet a partner drawn from the distribution

of singles and observe an initial match quality s0t . If they are married, they observe the realization of the match quality shock ξtτ . Based on these state variables, marital status and sharing rule are jointly decided. Conditional on a marital status, consumption, labor supply and program participation choices are made, which determine the state variables in the following period. 4 4.1 4.11 Structural Estimation Parametrization Preferences A person’s within-period utility function is a c · eψ(M,k )·P u(c, P, B) = 1−γ
1−γ − ηB. In the above, when a person works (P =1) her marginal utility consumption (c) changes, by an amount depending on whether she has a child or not. η represents the stigma cost claiming AFDC/TANF benefits. When married, men also incur a utility cost of being on welfare if their wife is claiming benefits. 36 Source: http://www.doksinet 4.12 Partner meeting process Couples meet with probability λt . We parametrize λt to vary over

time according to the following rule: 2 eλ0 +λ1 ·t+λ2 ·t λt = . 1 + eλ0 +λ1 ·t+λ2 ·t2 When a couple meets, it draws an initial match quality s0 drawn from a distribution N (0, σs0 ). If marriage occurs, match quality then evolves as a random walk for married couples as: −1 sτt = sτt−1 + ξtτ where τ are the years of marriage and innovations ξ τ follow a distribution N (0, σξ ). Hence, we allow the distribution of the initial match quality draw and the one of the subsequent innovations to differ. 4.13 Children Children affect consumption, benefits eligibility and the opportunity cost of women’s time on the labor market. We use the OECD equivalence scale to account for the cost of providing for a child.8 We also account for child care costs in the budget constraint. 8 Available at http://www.oecdorg/eco/growth/OECD-Note-EquivalenceScales pdf, accessed August 7, 2015. 37 Source: http://www.doksinet 4.2 The welfare system We model the welfare system by

considering AFDC/TANF, food stamps and EITC benefits. Eligibility for these benefits is based on a combination of economic and demographic criteria. AFDC and TANF benefits amounts are established for different household compositions and household income levels by taking an average benefit level across states, weighted by the states’ population. In our model, all adult earnings determine income eligibility for AFDC/TANF. Similarly, we include food stamps by taking an average of food stamps amounts by different household compositions and household income levels across states, weighted by the states’ population. Unlike AFDC or TANF, food stamps are available to all households, irrespectively of the presence and of the age of the children. Eligibility and amount of food stamp benefits are determined by accounting for adult earnings and for AFDC or TANF benefits, which generate household income, as well as household assets.9 We compute EITC benefits based on all adult earnings and,

post-reform, on an asset test. 4.3 Estimation of the wage/earnings processes We use the SIPP data to estimate the earnings (men) and wage (women) processes and restrict the sample to individuals between 23 and 60 years old, 9 See http://dhs.dcgov/page/chapter-4-determining-countable-income, cessed August 14 2015. 38 ac- Source: http://www.doksinet Figure 7: AFDC benefits and household income by marital status 400 couple with 1 child single with 1 child Montly benefits 300 200 100 0 0 5000 10000 Household annual income 15000 (a) AFDC benefits Notes: dropping all college graduates and constructing a yearly panel.10 We drop individuals whose hourly wage is less than one half the minimum wage in some of the years she reported being working and we drop observations whose percentage growth of average hourly earnings is a missing value, if it is lower than −70% or higher than 400%. The hourly wage variable we use corresponds to the sum of the reported earnings within a year

divided by the sum of hours within that same year. Annual hours are computed as: reported weekly “usual hours of work” × the number of weeks at the job within the month × number of months the individual reported positive earnings. 4.31 Men’s earnings We compute GMM estimates of the variance of the permanent component of log income (σζ2 ) and the variance of the measurement error (σε2 ), based on 10 We take the sum of earnings and hours worked to construct the average hourly earning. For the rest of the variables, we consider the last observation within a year. 39 Source: http://www.doksinet the following moment conditions: E[∆u2t ] = σζ2 + 2σε2 E[∆ut ∆ut−1 ] = −σε2 4.32 Women’s wage We first estimate the following model. Wages are: log wit = X0it β + εit . Wages are observed only when the woman works (Pit = 1), which happens under the following condition: Pit = 1 if Z0it γ + νit > 0, where wit is annual earnings. In Xit we include age

dummies, disability status, race, state dummies and year dummies. In Zit we include Xit and a vector of simulated welfare benefits, as described in Low and Pistaferri (2015), Appendix C. In particular, we use state, year and demographic variation in simulated AFDC, EITC and food stamps benefits for a single mother with varying number of children. The first stage is reported in table 9 GMM estimates of the variance of the permanent component of log income (σζ2 ) are computed based on the following moment conditions: 40 Source: http://www.doksinet  E[∆ut | Pt = 1, Pt−1 E[∆u2t | Pt = 1, Pt−1  φ(αt ) = 1] = σζW η 1 − Φ(αt )   φ(αt ) 2 2 = 1] = σζW + σζW η αt + 2σε2W 1 − Φ(αt ) E[∆ut ∆ut−1 | Pt = 1, Pt−1 = 1, Pt−2 = 1] = −σε2W Table 9: Employment status Probit regressions - Women (1) coeff. VARIABLES (2) marg. eff Average AFDC payment ($100) -0.0674* -0.0224* (0.00715) (0.00237) Average food stamps payment ($100) -0.0276

-0.00917 (0.1000) (0.0332) Average EITC payment ($100) 0.165* 0.0547* (0.0561) (0.0186) Age dummies Yes State dummies Yes Year dummies Yes Controls Yes Observations 64,696 Standard errors in parentheses * p<0.01, * p<0.05, * p<0.1 Notes: Data from the 1990-2008 SIPP panels. Sample of non-college graduates Annualized data 41 Source: http://www.doksinet 4.4 Estimation of the fertility process We allow each household to have up to one child, and compute the transition probability from no children to one child using SIPP data. We first estimate the initial condition as the probability of a woman in period 1 (age 20) has a child of age a as P (k1a > 0). Then, we compute the Markov process for fertility by examining transition probabilities in the SIPP data as a function of a woman’s age and marital status a P r(kt+1 |kta = 0, Mt , ageft ). Figure 8 plots the estimated transition probabilities from having no child to having one by a woman’s age and marital status in

the SIPP. Figure 8: Probability of having a first child by woman’s age and marital status 0.09 married single probability of having a child 0.08 0.07 0.06 0.05 0.04 0.03 0.02 0.01 0 20 25 age Source: Data from SIPP panels 1990-2010. 42 30 35 Source: http://www.doksinet 4.5 Estimation of the distributions of the singles’ characteristics Computational constraints prevent us from solving for the equilibrium in the marriage market in the estimation routine. We instead use the empirical distribution of the characteristics of singles in the SIPP data. We model the joint distribution of {Ajt , ytj } by assuming that {ln(Ajt ), ln(ytj )} are disM M M tributed as bivariate normals. For men, {ln(AM t ), ln(yt )} ∼ BV N (µt , Σt ) M depends on the single man’s age, while for women {ln(AM t ), ln(yt )} ∼ W BV N (µW ta , Σta ) also depends on the age of her youngest child. We allow also for additional mass for the cases in which Ajt = 0 or ytj = 0. We use the same

selection correction procedure described above to estimate the distribution of single women’s offer wages for those single women who do not work. 4.6 Moments estimation We estimate the remaining parameters of model by the Method of Sim- ulated Moments (McFadden, 1989): minΠ (φ̂data − φsim (Π))G(φ̂data − φsim (Π))0 . (3) The vector Π contains the following parameters: the utility cost of working for unmarried women without children (ψ 00 ), the cost of working for married women without (ψ 01 ), the cost of working for married women with a child (ψ 11 ), the cost of working for unmarried women with a child (ψ 10 ), the variance of match quality at marriage (σs20 ), the variance of innovations to 43 Source: http://www.doksinet match quality (σξ2 ), the parametrization probability of meeting partner over the life cycle (λ0 , λ1 , λ2 ) and the cost of being on welfare (η). We estimate our empirical moments φdata on the SIPP sample of women without a

college degree. We focus on the 1960-’69 birth cohort pre-reform, i.e women between age 21 and 35 We annualize data by considering the marital status, fertility, employment status and welfare participation status that women had for more than half of the calendar year. We use a diagonal matrix with the variances of the empirical moments as weighting matrix G. Table 13 reports the empirical targeted moments and shows the resulting fit. 4.7 Estimated and pre-set parameters Table 11 summarizes the life cycle timeline of the model. Women enter the model at age 21, men at age 23. Marriage takes place between people who are two years apart. Until age 35, a woman can conceive her (one and only) child. That implies that she can have a child below age 18, and hence be potentially eligible for welfare, until she is 53. Age 53 is also the last year in which a woman can get married. After that age, she can divorce but will remain single if the does. In addition, women between the ages of 21

and 60 decide whether or not to work and retire thereafter, living up to age 79. 4.8 Parameter estimates The parameters are separated into three groups: those we set from sources in the literature or in the case of child care costs, directly computed from 44 Source: http://www.doksinet Table 10: Target moments Moment % % % % % % % % % % % % % % % % % % % % % % % % % % % % % % % ever married at age 21 ever married at age 22 ever married at age 23 ever married at age 24 ever married at age 25 ever married at age 26 ever married at age 27 ever married at age 28 ever married at age 29 ever married at age 30 ever married at age 31 ever married at age 32 ever married at age 33 ever married at age 34 ever married at age 35 divorced at age 25 divorced at age 26 divorced at age 27 divorced at age 28 divorced at age 29 divorced at age 30 divorced at age 31 divorced at age 32 divorced at age 33 divorced at age 34 divorced at age 35 employed (married without children) employed (unmarried

without children) employed (married with children) employed (unmarried with children) on AFDC (unmarried with children) Data Model moment (s.e in %) 31.20% 0.03% 30.30% 46.46% 0.02% 37.04% 53.54% 0.01% 48.85% 63.22% 0.01% 62.30% 67.58% 0.01% 70.43% 72.08% 0.01% 75.73% 74.65% 0.01% 78.45% 78.60% 0.01% 80.21% 81.35% 0.00% 81.42% 82.49% 0.00% 82.42% 85.16% 0.00% 82.56% 85.76% 0.00% 82.47% 86.20% 0.00% 82.58% 85.76% 0.01% 82.61% 87.02% 0.01% 82.99% 10.51% 0.00% 12.18% 11.81% 0.00% 11.80% 13.32% 0.00% 11.65% 14.78% 0.00% 12.18% 15.54% 0.00% 12.76% 15.52% 0.00% 13.71% 16.05% 0.00% 14.76% 17.17% 0.01% 15.70% 16.75% 0.01% 16.99% 17.51% 0.01% 18.24% 18.63% 0.01% 19.22% 85.45% 0.01% 83.74% 87.96% 0.01% 88.99% 60.02% 0.00% 60.04% 55.78% 0.01% 55.31% 37.53% 0.01% 36.47% Notes: SIPP data 1985-2011. Sample of women born in the 1960s and aged 21-35 without college degrees. Annualized data 45 Source: http://www.doksinet Table 11: Life cycle timeline t 1-15 16-33 woman’s age 21-35 36-53

man’s age 23-37 38-55 benefit elig. Yes Yes labor supply Choice Choice 34-40 41-59 54-60 61-79 56-62 63-81 No No Choice Retired fertility marriage Can conceive child Can have child below 18 No children at home No children at home Can marry and divorce Can marry and divorce Can divorce Can divorce the CEX; those estimated by us but outside the model; and those used to fit the moments we defined in the previous section. Both male and female earnings are subject to relatively high variance of permanent shocks with male earnings shocks having a standard deviation of 15%, while female wages 20%. Initial heterogeneity is large, with a standard deviation of initial wages for men and women of approximately 36% and 38% respectively, implying large initial inequality in productivities. Male and female wages have a concave lifecycle profile as usual Arrival rates of partners decline with age, but at a decreasing rate. The stigma cost of welfare benefits is high, and is identified by

the women who are not claiming benefits while eligible given their income and assets. In the pre-reform period there was no intertemporal cost to claiming, and hence we can attribute not claiming to utility or other costs of claiming. In the counterfactual simulations, for the post reform period, the intertemporal tradeoff will add to this cost, which makes it important to identify it from a period where such a cost is not present. 46 Source: http://www.doksinet Table 12: Parameters of the model Value/source Panel A - Parameters fixed from other sources 1.5 Relative risk aversion (γ) Discount factor (β) 0.98 Childcare costs (CC a ) CEX Economies of scale in marriage (ρ) 1.23 (Voena 2015) Panel B - Parameters estimated outside the model 0.13 Variance of men’s unexplained earnings in period 1 Variance of women’s unexplained wages in period 1 0.15 Variance of men’s earnings shocks 0.027 Variance of women’s wage shocks 0.041 M M Life cycle profile of log male earnings (aM ,

a , a ) 9.76, 0.043, -0.001 0 1 2 W W Life cycle profile of log female wages (aW , a , a ) 2.48, 0.013, -0.0001 0 1 2 Panel C - Initial conditions 24.35% % married at age 20 % divorced at age 20 3.90% Panel D - Parameters estimated by MSM -1.2821 Cost of working for unmarried women without children (ψ 00 ) Cost of working for married women without children (ψ 10 ) -0.9959 Cost of working for unmarried women with a child (ψ 01 ) -1.2728 Cost of working for married women with a child (ψ 11 ) -1.2275 Variance of match quality at marriage (σs20 ) 0.0027 Variance of innovations to match quality (σξ2 ) 0.0027 Probability of meeting partner by age λ0 0.1598 λ1 -0.2359 λ2 -0.0185 Cost of being on welfare (η) 0.0065 Parameter 4.9 Quantitative implications of the model To study the quantitative implications of our model, we begin by exam- ining how our model fits patterns in the data that are not explicitly targeted by the estimation. First, we examine how the selection into

employment implied by the model compares to the one in the SIPP data, by plotting the life-cycle profiles 47 Source: http://www.doksinet of (log) wages of women, both unconditionally and conditionally on marital status (figure 9). Because our simulations only follow women, we can also study how the earnings of the men they marry compare to those of married men in the SIPP data (figure 10). Both sets of estimates reveal that the model does a very good job at replicating these empirical profiles. Figure 9: Life-cycle profiles of log-wages for women in the data and in the model 3.4 3.5 3.2 3.2 3 3 2.8 2.8 2.6 mean mean mean 3 2.6 2.4 2.5 2.4 2.2 2.2 2 2 20 25 30 age 35 (a) All women 40 2 20 25 30 age 35 (b) Married women 40 1.8 20 25 30 age 35 40 (c) Single women As an additional validation of our model, we replicate our differencein-differences analysis by simulating the introduction of TANF for different women at different ages according to the age

distribution in 1997 in our SIPP dataset. Table 13 reports the estimated coefficients on the simulated data and in the SIPP data, focusing on the sample of women aged 21 to 53, which are the ages of eligibility in the model given fertility. The simulated estimates are qualitatively, and often quantitatively close to the empirical ones. Last, we study what implications our estimated model has for variables that we cannot observe in the data. We begin by examining the distribution of resources in the household. The mean Pareto weight for women is about H E[θ ] one half of the one for men ( E[θ W] = 48 0.35 0.65 = 0.54) This number is in line Source: http://www.doksinet Figure 10: Life-cycle profiles of log-earnings for men in the data and in the model 10.8 10.6 10.4 mean 10.2 10 9.8 9.6 9.4 9.2 20 25 30 age 35 40 Table 13: Difference-in-differences estimates in the simulated data and in the SIPP data Variable Coef. Sim Coef data 95% CI 95% CI Welfare -0.041 -0.055 -0.061

-0.049 Welfare (married) -0.001 -0.020 -0.025 -0.015 Welfare (unmarried) -0.101 -0.157 -0.176 -0.139 Employed 0.026 0.026 0.013 0.040 Employed (married) 0.009 -0.001 -0.016 0.015 Employed (unmarried) 0.052 0.085 0.064 0.106 Divorced -0.011 -0.030 -0.045 -0.015 Married -0.008 -0.009 -0.027 0.010 Assets -731.100 -5621.380 -9911.871 -1330888 Assets (married) -1780 -9847 -15588 -4106 Assets (unmarried) 1315 1256 -3952 6464 with estimates and calibrations from the literature on collective household models for the Unites States, the United Kingdom, and Japan (Lise and Seitz, 2011; Mazzocco, Yamaguchi and Ruiz, 2013; Voena, 2015; Lise and Yamada, 49 Source: http://www.doksinet 2014). Below, we plot the relationship between consumption sharing and earnings/wage shares. As expected, the model produces a positive correlation between wages and private consumption. 5 The impact of time limits in the estimated model In counterfactuals exercise, we simulate the introduction of the PRWORA. We

do so in two stages: first, we maintain all features of AFDC place, but impose a 5-year time limit. In a second step, we allow for TANF to differ from AFDC not only because of time limits, but also because of the mapping between household income and benefits by marital status (figure 12). Under AFDC, the average welfare users is on welfare for 6.2 years Time limits are binding for 12.5% of women under AFDC, and we observe significant bunching at 5 years once the limit is introduced (figure 13) Under a 5-year time limit, the average utilization among welfare users drops to 3.36, and to 3.2 under TANF There is substantial bunching at 5 years, but also a reduction in overall utilization, due to banking (figure 13). 50 Source: http://www.doksinet Figure 11: Consumption allocation in the household (a) Earnings (b) Offer wages (c) Offer wages at marriage 51 Source: http://www.doksinet Figure 12: TANF benefits and household income by marital status 400 couple with 1 child single

with 1 child Montly benefits 300 200 100 0 0 2000 4000 6000 8000 10000 12000 14000 Household annual income Notes: Simulated TANF monthly payments based on population-weighted state averages. 52 Source: http://www.doksinet Figure 13: Lifecycle welfare utilization by program 0.8 AFDC AFDC + 5−year limit TANF 0.7 0.6 frequency 0.5 0.4 0.3 0.2 0.1 0 0 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 lifetime years of benefits utilization 13 14 15 16 17 18 Notes: Simulation from estimated model. Table 14: Long-term effects of time limits and TANF Table 15: tab:counter From AFDC to 5-year time limit all married Welfare utilization -0.0231 -00002 Employed +0.0071 -00055 Divorced -0.0376 Married +0.0369 Assets (%) -0.0118 -00398 From AFDC to TANF all married Welfare utilization -0.0253 Employed 0.0096 Divorced -0.0389 Married +0.0388 Assets (%) +0.015 53 unmarried -0.0454 +0.0209 -0.0099 unmarried +0.001 -0.0054 -0.0521 +0.0265 -0.0156 +0.0181 Source:

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a model of labor market behavior.” Journal of Human Resources, 479–506. 57 Source: http://www.doksinet Appendix Definition of variables Program participation equals 1 if the individual reports to be covered by AFDC program and 0 otherwise. Later, AFDC regressions are run at the household level. We consider a family covered by AFDC if at least one member of the household reports to be covered. Employed equals 1 if an individual reports having a job at least one week during the past month and 0 otherwise. Assets equals the sum of total net worth (debt minus unsecured debt), home equity, real state equity, IRA and KEOGH accounts, net equity in vehicles. Liquid assets total net worth (debt minus unsecured debt). Married equals 1 if the individual reports being married and 0 otherwise. Divorced/Separated equals 1 if the individual reports being separated or divorce and 0 otherwise. 58 (2) AFDC/ TANF unmarried (3) employed unmarried (4) employed (5) divorced/ separated 59

-0.0239* (0.00903) Yes Yes Yes Yes 57,591 0.200 (6) married Notes: Data from the 1990-2008 SIPP panels. Sample of households in which the head is not a college graduate with at least a child below age 19. The full set of controls includes age dummies, education dummies, number of children dummies, year-by-month fixed effects, state fixed effects, demographics fixed effects, state-by-demographics fixed effects, state-by-year fixed effects. Standard errors in parentheses, clustered at the state level -0.0687* -0.190* 0.0329* 0.0818* -0.0251* (0.00515) (0.0125) (0.00954) (0.0169) (0.00836) Basic controls Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Race Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Disability status Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Unemp. rate*Demog. Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Observations 57,591 21,112 57,591 21,112 57,591 R-squared 0.116 0.196 0.105 0.171 0.028 Standard errors in parentheses clustered at the state level * p<0.01, * p<0.05, * p<0.1 T reatdst P ostst VARIABLES (1) AFDC/ TANF Table 16: OLS regressions with

first two waves of each SIPP panel Source: http://www.doksinet (2) employed (3) employed married (4) employed married (5) employed unmarried 60 0.0370* (0.0101) Yes Yes Yes Yes 100,140 0.196 (6) employed unmarried Notes: Data from the 1990-2008 SIPP panels. Sample of non-college graduates with at least a child below age 19 The full set of controls includes age dummies, education dummies, number of children dummies, year-by-month fixed effects, state fixed effects, demographics fixed effects, state-by-demographics fixed effects, state-by-year fixed effects. Standard errors in parentheses, clustered at the state level. 0.0173* 0.0124* -0.000858 -000400 00469* (0.00624) (000591) (000822) (000773) (00111) Basic controls Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Race No Yes No Yes No Disability status No Yes No Yes No Unemp. rate*Demog. No Yes No Yes No Observations 260,528 260,528 160,388 160,388 100,140 R-squared 0.063 0.133 0.063 0.113 0.081 Standard errors in parentheses clustered at the state

level * p<0.01, * p<0.05, * p<0.1 T reatdst P ostst VARIABLES (1) employed Table 17: Employment status OLS regressions - Women with child above age 5 Source: http://www.doksinet