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Wife or businesswoman? The role of work time, gender-dominated jobs and prestige in defining women’s entry into union in Italy
Alessandra Minello, Valentina Tocchioni

##manager.scheduler.building##: Velodromo - Bocconi University
##manager.scheduler.room##: N06
Date: 2019-01-25 02:00 PM – 03:30 PM
Last modified: 2018-12-26

Abstract


Despite Italian familistic organization, women’s labour market participation is changing in the last decades and affecting family formation practices. In this paper, we aim to verify the relationship between women’s home- or work- oriented attitudes and the entry into first union in Italy, concentrating on three diverse aspects: work time, gender segregation of the job and level of prestige. Using data on Italian women aged 2559 stemming from the 2009 Multipurpose Family and Social Subjects Survey, we apply event-history techniques on the transition to first marriage and cohabitation. We find that women with a voluntary part-time job are the most prone to enter into a union, either cohabitation or marriage. Women’s gender-dominated profession combined with contract stability shows only a feeble relationship with the entry into cohabitation or marriage. It emerges clearly the moderated role of employment uncertainty through the gender-dominated position in shaping the entry into first marriage. Occupational prestige plays a key role in influencing the risk of entering into first marriage, but not into cohabitation.

Keywords


Marriage; cohabitation; gender; work; Italy