The Lanham Act was a federal infrastructure bill passed by Congress in 1940 and eventually used to fund programs for the preschool and school-aged children of working women during WWII. It remains, to this day, the only example in US history of an (almost) universal, largely federally supported childcare program. We explore its role in enabling and increasing the labor supply of mothers during WWII using information on the program, war contracts, and employment at the city level. Use of Lanham Act funds for a wartime childcare program was initially controversial. However, the program was eventually well funded per child in average daily attendance and provided generally high-quality care. But it was late to start, limited in scope, and incapable of greatly increasing women’s employment in the aggregate. Childcare facilities were funded more in places that already had higher participation rates of mothers suggesting that facilities were effective in caring for the children but did not greatly increase the employment of mothers. Their impact on the children served is still to be determined.

The Lanham Act was a federal infrastructure bill passed by Congress in 1940 and eventually used to fund programs for the preschool and school-aged children of working women during WWII. It remains, to this day, the only example in US history of an (almost) universal, largely federally supported childcare program. We explore its role in enabling and increasing the labor supply of mothers during WWII using information on the program, war contracts, and employment at the city level. Use of Lanham Act funds for a wartime childcare program was initially controversial. However, the program was eventually well funded per child in average daily attendance and provided generally high-quality care. But it was late to start, limited in scope, and incapable of greatly increasing women’s employment in the aggregate. Childcare facilities were funded more in places that already had higher participation rates of mothers suggesting that facilities were effective in caring for the children but did not greatly increase the employment of mothers. Their impact on the children served is still to be determined.

The Lanham Act was a federal infrastructure bill passed by Congress in 1940 and eventually used to fund programs for the preschool and school-aged children of working women during WWII. It remains, to this day, the only example in US history of an (almost) universal, largely federally supported childcare program. We explore its role in enabling and increasing the labor supply of mothers during WWII using information on the program, war contracts, and employment at the city level. Use of Lanham Act funds for a wartime childcare program was initially controversial. However, the program was eventually well funded per child in average daily attendance and provided generally high-quality care. But it was late to start, limited in scope, and incapable of greatly increasing women’s employment in the aggregate. Childcare facilities were funded more in places that already had higher participation rates of mothers suggesting that facilities were effective in caring for the children but did not greatly increase the employment of mothers. Their impact on the children served is still to be determined.

These files are designed to increase the accessibility of the "Career Plans and Experiences of June 1961, College Graduates" data. The raw data can be downloaded from ICPSR dataset 7344. These files provide dictionary files and STATA.do files to turn the original ASCII files into .dta files that can be analyzed using Stata. Included in this folder are the original ASCII files, the dictionary files, the Stata .do files to apply these labels, and the resulting Stata .dta files.
For further details on these data and an illustration of their application, see: Goldin, (2021). "Career and Family: Women's Century-Long Journey Towards Equity", Princeton University Press.

These files are designed to increase the accessibility of the "Career Plans and Experiences of June 1961, College Graduates" data. The raw data can be downloaded from ICPSR dataset 7344. These files provide dictionary files and STATA.do files to turn the original ASCII files into .dta files that can be analyzed using Stata. Included in this folder are the original ASCII files, the dictionary files, the Stata .do files to apply these labels, and the resulting Stata .dta files.

These files are designed to increase the accessibility of the "Career Plans and Experiences of June 1961, College Graduates" data. The raw data can be downloaded from ICPSR dataset 7344. These files provide dictionary files and STATA.do files to turn the original ASCII files into .dta files that can be analyzed using Stata. Included in this folder are the original ASCII files, the dictionary files, the Stata .do files to apply these labels, and the resulting Stata .dta files.
For further details on these data and an illustration of their application, see: Goldin, (2021). "Career and Family: Women's Century-Long Journey Towards Equity", Princeton University Press.

These files are designed to increase the accessibility of the "Career Plans and Experiences of June 1961, College Graduates" data. The raw data can be downloaded from ICPSR dataset 7344. These files provide dictionary files and STATA.do files to turn the original ASCII files into .dta files that can be analyzed using Stata. Included in this folder are the original ASCII files, the dictionary files, the Stata .do files to apply these labels, and the resulting Stata .dta files.
For further details on these data and an illustration of their application, see: Goldin, (2021). "Career and Family: Women's Century-Long Journey Towards Equity", Princeton University Press.

:unav

We study employers' perceptions of the value of postsecondary degrees using a field experiment. We randomly assign the sector and selectivity of institutions to fictitious resumes and apply to real vacancy postings for business and health jobs on a large online job board. We find that a business bachelor's degree from a for-profit online institution is 22 percent less likely to receive a callback than one from a nonselective public institution. In applications to health jobs, we find that for-profit credentials receive fewer callbacks unless the job requires an external quality indicator such as an occupational license.

This data collection contains information on women workers living apart from their families, or "adrift," in New York City and Philadelphia. It is similar in origin to the WOMAN AND CHILD WAGE EARNERS (ICPSR 20702), WOMAN AND CHILD WAGE EARNERS, MARRIED (ICPSR 20720), and WOMAN AND CHILD WAGE EARNERS, WORKING WOMEN IN NEW YORK CITY LIVING AT HOME (ICPSR 20721) data collections. Somewhat more comprehensive information exists for it than for the ICPSR 20721 sample, which is very similar in content. The data for this sample were collected for women living apart from their families of origin. Variables include: age, work experience, ethnicity, average weekly earnings, and whether the place of work was a store or manufacturing enterprise. In addition to these variables there is information on years of schooling, weekly expenditures for car fare, shelter and food, and remittances home or contributions to other relatives. It should be emphasized that the respondents were asked about their years of schooling. The education variable, therefore, is not derived but was given by the women, which is quite extraordinary for the period. Additionally, there is no information on the marital status of these women. It is presumed that they are either unmarried, widowed, or divorced (or separated) because they are all living apart from other family members.