The Impact of Paid Sick Leave Mandates on Child Maltreatment

• In Event: Upstream Policies, Downstream Harm: Systemic Influences on Child Welfare

Abstract

Child maltreatment remains a critical public issue in the United States, with over half a million children reported as victims in 2022 (U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, 2024). While labor market policies rarely target abuse directly, changes in caregivers’ time and financial constraints can alter the home environment in ways that influence child safety. This paper examines whether Paid Sick Leave (PSL) mandates—laws requiring employers to provide job-protected paid time off for short-term health needs—reduce reported child maltreatment.

Using agency-level data from the National Incident-Based Reporting System (NIBRS) from 2007 to 2019, I exploit the staggered adoption of PSL mandates across U.S. states and cities in an event study framework. Estimating intent-to-treat effects with the interaction-weighted (IW) estimator from Sun and Abraham (2021). I find that PSL mandates lead to a significant 10% reduction in reported child victimization, with effects concentrated in physical abuse cases. The declines are most pronounced among children aged 2–5 and when the offender is a female caregiver. These findings are robust to alternative model specifications, sample restrictions, and a series of sensitivity tests that address potential threats to internal validity. 

To investigate mechanisms, I evaluate four potential channels using supplemental data from the American Time Use Survey (ATUS) and the Current Population Survey (CPS): parental time use, household dynamics, financial well-being, and caregiver health. PSL mandates modestly increase maternal time spent with children, particularly among single mothers, but this is inconsistent with exposure-driven risk, which would predict an increase in abuse. I also find no evidence of changes in caregiving arrangements or within-household dynamics: probability of spending time with non-own children remains flat, and neither cohabitation rates nor the number of intimate partner violence victims significantly change following PSL adoption. Instead, I find that PSL mandates increase employment and full-time work rates among mothers, and raise wages among those with school-aged children. Additionally, self-reported health improves significantly among parents of young children. These gains reduce caregiver stress, which is a well-documented risk factor for child maltreatment.

A back-of-the-envelope calculation suggests that these mandates prevent approximately 0.057 reported victims per 1,000 children annually, translating to an estimated $3.54 billion in avoided lifetime costs from reduced maltreatment. These findings highlight the value of modest, flexible workplace protections in promoting child welfare. They also expand the scope of PSL research by identifying child maltreatment as a high-stakes outcome influenced by labor policy. In contrast to longer-term leave programs, PSL provides low-cost, employer-funded support for everyday caregiving needs, suggesting that even limited labor protections can yield meaningful public health benefits.

Author

• Zhuoyu Qiu, University of California, Riverside
  Presenting Author