What should we do about the employment of women with children in Russia? The role of preschool educational institutions

Abstract

The paper examines the opportunities and obstacles to increasing the employment of women with children in Russia. There is a tight correlation between Russia’s lagging behind in the share of working women with children under the age of three and a lack of supply of preschool and childcare institutions. Using quantitative analysis of the Russian regions, we show that the expansion of the supply of preschool education services is associated with an increase in the employment of women, and the cost of introducing additional places in preschool organizations is recouped by additional tax revenues from working women with children in two years. Our cross-country analysis shows that the transition from traditional gender and social roles to more equal ones, the reduction of gender inequality, the encouragement of fathers to take parental leave, and the increased availability of part-time or flexible-schedule employment for women with children could further facilitate the employment of women with children. Our estimates show that an increase of preschool enrollment in Russia to the level of European countries would materialize a sizable economic growth potential: an increase in income per capita would be 3.5%.