Childbirth, Early Voting, and Turnout

• In Event: Socialization, Learning, and Voter Turnout

Abstract

This paper studies the effect of childbirth on turnout in Swedish elections. Using detailed individual-level data on voting, matched with birth data, we find that childbirth decreases turnout by close to 20 percentage points, and that this decrease is larger among mothers than fathers. We show that parents who anticipate childbirth close to or on election day are substantially more likely to cast an early vote, which counters some of the drop in turnout due to childbirth. Furthermore, the drop in turnout due to childbirth is larger among low-skilled parents, which can be explained by high-skill parents being more likely to compensate the anticipated drop in turnout by casting an early vote. These results demonstrates how early voting maintains high turnout among voters that are unable to cast their votes on election day.

Authors

• Sirus Håfström Dehdari, Uppsala University

• Karl-Oskar Lindgren, Uppsala University

• Sven Oskarsson, Uppsala University