Working Papers

The WNE Working Papers series has been published by the Faculty of Economic Sciences at the University of Warsaw since 2008.

The WNE Working Papers series provides a fast, open channel for disseminating research conducted at the Faculty of Economic Sciences, University of Warsaw. The papers hosted here are working versions (pre-prints) and may evolve as authors refine their analyses, incorporate feedback, or progress through formal peer-review. What you read is the current version released by the authors, timestamped and assigned DOI/ISSN identifiers to ensure precise citation and version tracking. Copyright remains with the authors, who may, at any time, upload a revised file or add a note directing readers to a later, peer-reviewed publication.

The Working Papers series accepts articles by research employees of the Faculty and publications from conferences organised at the Faculty of Economic Sciences at the University of Warsaw. Articles should be original research papers which have not been previously published, on the subject of economics.

Please send your paper by e-mail: mNtsfjS&D-}y!Rw37[1V?9n.cLO]#[e=g_PY7t|xclsio|wd%NHyS~l98 

Please send 2 files:

(1) the main text without the title of the article and the authors (DOC/DOCX file) and

(2) the title page including: the title of the paper, the authors and their affiliation (DOC/DOCX file).

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Number of Results 2

WP(9/2025)472. The End of an Era. The Vanishing Negative Effect of Women’s Employment on Fertility

Authors: Matysiak Anna, Daniele Vignoli
This paper addresses whether women’s employment in the 21st century remains a barrier to family formation, as it was in the 1980s and 1990s, or—similar to men’s—it has become a prerequisite for childbearing. We address this qu…

WP472. The End of an Era. The Vanishing Negative Effect of Women’s Employment on Fertility

This paper addresses whether women’s employment in the 21st century remains a barrier to family formation, as it was in the 1980s and 1990s, or—similar to men’s—it has become a prerequisite for childbearing. We address this question through a systematic quantitative review (meta-analysis) of empirical studies conducted in Europe, North America and Australia. We selected 94 studies published between 1990-2023 (N=572 effect sizes). Our analysis uncovers a fundamental shift in the relationship between women's employment and fertility. What was once a strongly negative association has become statistically insignificant in the 2000s and 2010s—and even turned positive in the Nordic countries and parts of Western Europe (France, Belgium, and the Netherlands). This shift is evident both among childless women and mothers and has occurred across all analyzed country clusters, except in the German/Southern European group, where the relationship has remained negative. These findings challenge longstanding assumptions about work-family trade-offs and suggest a reconfiguration of the economic and social conditions underpinning fertility decisions in contemporary high-income societies. The paper calls for a reconceptualization of the employment-fertility relationship and development of a new theoretical framework that better captures these evolving dynamics in contemporary high-income societies.


DOI: https://doi.org/10.33138/2957-0506.2025.9.472
Matysiak Anna, Daniele Vignoli
Women’s employment Fertility High-income countries Meta-analysis

WP(21/2014)138. Language and (the Estimates of) the Gender Wage Gap

Authors: Siwińska-Gorzelak Joanna, Goraus-Tańska Karolina, Tyrowicz Joanna, van der Velde Lucas Augusto
 In this paper we link the estimates of the gender wage gap with the gender sensitivity of the language spoken in a given country. We find that nations with more gender neutral languages tend to be characterized by lower estimates of GWG. The re…

WP138. Language and (the Estimates of) the Gender Wage Gap

 In this paper we link the estimates of the gender wage gap with the gender sensitivity of the language spoken in a given country. We find that nations with more gender neutral languages tend to be characterized by lower estimates of GWG. The results are robust to a number of sensitivity checks.


Siwińska-Gorzelak Joanna, Goraus-Tańska Karolina, Tyrowicz Joanna, van der Velde Lucas Augusto
gender wage gap language neutrality meta-analysis
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