Does the women’s employment–fertility U-shape emerge at the local level? Evidence from Italian municipalities

BACKGROUND The gender revolution and multiple equilibria perspectives suggest a U-shaped relationship between women’s employment and fertility as societies move from a traditional male breadwinner equilibrium, through institutional and normative mismatch, towards gender egalitarianism. Whether this pattern can be detected locally in a persistently low-fertility setting remains unclear. OBJECTIVE We ask whether the employment–fertility U-shape is visible across Italian municipalities and whether this relationship displays distinct territorial configurations across the country’s main macro-areas (North, Centre, and South and Islands). METHODS We construct a harmonized municipality-level dataset from Italian National Institute of Statistics sources for 2019–2024, projecting all observations onto the 2024 geography of 7,896 municipalities. We compute period averages of the general fertility rate and female employment at ages 25–64. We display descriptive associations for both the full sample and a restricted sample, excluding small municipalities, where fertility indicators are more exposed to statistical volatility. RESULTS In both samples, the association is U-shaped. Net of some minor overlaps, macro-area panels suggest that municipalities in the South and Islands are more often located on the traditional low-employment/high-fertility side, those in the Centre are around the low-fertility transitional segment, and those in the North are on the high-employment/highfertility side. CONCLUSIONS We illustrate that a U-shaped relationship is detectable at the finest available administrative scale for Italy. CONTRIBUTION This study documents a U-shaped employment–fertility association across Italian municipalities. The findings are consistent with a structural interpretation of low fertility, highlighting the importance of institutional and socioeconomic conditions that enable women and men to combine employment and parenthood.