Abstract:   This paper examines whether improving job security promotes family formation. I study South Korea's 2017 public-sector employment reform, which mandated that public-sector entities convert eligible fixed-term workers to open-ended employment, replacing short-term contracts subject to termination or uncertain renewal with open-ended positions at the same employer. I leverage pre-reform variation across entities in exposure to the mandate — measured by the share of fixed-term workers eligible for conversion — which is plausibly unrelated to subsequent conversion decisions and worker sorting across employers. Drawing on newly linked employer-employee-family administrative data, I find that greater exposure increased same-firm retention by 6.2 percentage points, primarily by reducing transitions to other firms, and raised first marriage by 3.7 percentage points, while first birth changed little overall. Gains in employment continuity were largest among men, particularly those in their late 20s, whose baseline same-firm retention was lowest. First-marriage effects were also concentrated among men but were similar across male age groups. By contrast, first-birth responses were more pronounced among workers in their early 30s of both genders. Evidence from independent surveys supports the job-security channel: the reform shifted employment composition toward open-ended employment, while individual transitions to open-ended employment were followed by a particularly pronounced improvement in perceived job security and a gradual increase in marriage. These findings suggest that policies that create credible pathways to stable employment can promote family formation, but that their effects on parenthood depend on life-course timing.

Abstract:  This study examined how the 2013 expansion of public preschool to all five-year-olds in Bangladesh affected divisions of labor between men and women in rural households. Research in high-income countries shows that public childcare reduces women's care burdens, increases their labor market participation, and fosters gender-egalitarian divisions of labor at home. Whether these effects extend to rural, low-income settings remains unclear, however. Using data from the 2011 and 2015 Bangladesh Integrated Household Survey, we applied a triple-differences model exploiting variations in preschool expansion intensity across districts, time, and ages of youngest household member to estimate effects on paid and unpaid labor. After the expansion of public preschool in Bangladesh, women's likelihood of working increased, primarily in agriculture and home-based work rather than wage-earning employment. Time-use data showed that after the expansion, women spent less time on housework and more time on income-generating activities, whereas men's time in both paid and unpaid labor remained largely unchanged. Consequently, women's total production time moderately increased and their satisfaction with the household division of labor modestly declined. In rural economies with scarce wage employment and persistent patriarchal norms, public childcare (e.g., universal preschool) can ease women's domestic time burdens and encourage their economic participation, but it does not necessarily transform the gendered organization of childcare and household labor.

Abstract: This paper studies asymmetric employment protection reforms in Europe that substantially changed the regulation of temporary contracts while leaving permanent-contract protection largely unchanged. By altering the relative regulatory burden on temporary versus permanent employment, such reforms change firms’ incentives to adjust employment across contract types, with potentially ambiguous implications for permanent employment and total employment. Using EU Labour Force Survey data and reform episodes identified from the OECD Employment Protection Legislation (EPL) index, I estimate employment responses to these reforms with an event-study design that exploits variation in reform timing, direction, and intensity across countries. I find a pronounced asymmetry across contract types: large changes in the relative regulation of temporary and permanent contracts generate substantial adjustment in temporary employment but little corresponding adjustment in permanent employment. Liberalizing temporary-contract regulation leads to a persistent increase in temporary employment, whereas tightening reforms reduce temporary employment only in the short run, followed by a subsequent rebound. Permanent employment remains largely unchanged in both cases. These results suggest that asymmetric reforms operate primarily through the temporary-employment margin, with limited substitution toward permanent contracts. While effects vary with reform intensity and the pre-existing regulatory gap across countries, reforms leave the underlying divide between temporary and permanent contracts largely intact. Temporary-contract reform alone may therefore expand employment primarily through less secure jobs when liberalized, while reducing temporary employment without generating offsetting permanent jobs when tightened. This asymmetry highlights the limits of one-sided reform when adjustment costs on the permanent-contract side remain high. 

Abstract: This paper examines the impact of the 2002 Fixed-Term Employees Regulations (FTER) in the United Kingdom, which introduced a statutory 4-year limit on successive fixed-term contracts (FTCs) unless the employer could provide objective justification. The FTER aims to curb the prolonged use of FTCs and promote transitions into permanent employment. The UK offers a distinctive setting: its relatively narrow employment protection legislation (EPL) gap —the regulatory cost differential between fixed-term and permanent contracts—implies that conversion incentives should, in theory, be stronger. Using an event study design and UK Labour Force Survey (UKLFS) data, I find that the FTER produced a clear short-term compliance effect: the probability of conversion from FTC to permanent employment increased, particularly within the same employer. However, this effect was not sustained in the longer term. Analysis of Employment Tribunal decisions reveals that employers relied on the "objective justification" exemption to extend FTCs beyond the 4-year threshold. These findings suggest that narrowing the EPL gap is necessary but not sufficient to foster permanent employment: achieving lasting improvements in job stability for fixed-term workers requires more than aligning regulatory costs across contract types—it requires regulatory design precise enough to deter strategic evasion and sustain compliance over time. 

Motivation:  Do equal treatment rights improve the quality of fixed-term jobs? This paper provides evidence from the UK and Ireland, where equal treatment legislation for fixed-term workers was introduced in the early 2000s in response to the 1999 EU Fixed-Term Work Directive. The reforms directly targeted fixed-term employees while leaving open-ended employees and agency workers largely unaffected. Using employee-level data from the European Working Conditions Survey, I implement difference-in-differences designs that exploit variation over time and across contract types. I compare fixed-term workers before and after the reforms with workers not directly covered by the legislation, including open-ended employees and agency workers. The analysis examines multiple dimensions of job quality, including job satisfaction, perceived employment security, pay, working hours, training, and promotion prospects. The paper asks whether formal equal treatment rights translated into tangible improvements in the working conditions and perceived quality of fixed-term jobs, or whether their effects were largely confined to formal legal protections.

• Is the Meister Vocational High School More Cost-Effective? International Journal of Educational Development, 51, 84–95 (2016). 

with Kye W. Lee and Hakyeong Lee [Paper]

• Twenty Years After Transition: An Empirical Study on Income Inequality, Institutional Development and Economic Growth Journal of Regional Development Studies, 27(1), 27–66 (2018).  

with Changyong Choi

• Microfinance Institution’s Dual Missions: Does Profit Status Matter? International Development and Cooperation Review, 10(3), 285–316, 2018. (with Kye W. Lee) 

• Data Work: Philippines (The WB’s Strategic Impact Evaluation Fund) [Project]

• Field Work: Lao PDR (Funds from Korea Foundation for International Health) [Project]