INCERTEZZA ECONOMICA E FORMAZIONE DELL’UNIONE IN ITALIA: UN’ANALISI CAUSALE

The relationship between economic uncertainty and family dynamics is a central theme of public interest for contemporary societies. Employment uncertainty, which reflects the possibility of experiencing adverse conditions in the labor market during the life course, has by now spread from the work to the private sphere, influencing the choices of family formation. This paper aims to advance our understanding of the causal impact of employment uncertainty on union formation in Italy. Previous studies have addressed this issue by using even-history analysis techniques, suggesting a positive (negative) association between job uncertainty and cohabitation (marriage). By adopting the potential outcome approach to causal inference, we point to quantify the net effect of having a first job with a temporary or a permanent contract on the propensity to cohabit or get married within the first three years of employment. Analyzing a sample of women between 18 and 49 years stemming from the 2009 Multipurpose Families and Social Subjects survey, our results suggest that, three years after the first job started, 5% of women with precarious work contracts would have been married if they had a permanent contract, instead of being single. The effect is even accelerated for women having a secondary education, where the percentage of “lost” or postponed marriages is close to 4% even one year after the first job started. When the work is uncertain, Italian women seem to postpone the “more stable” form of union that is marriage.