Human Capital, Female Employment, and Electricity: Evidence from the Early 20th-Century United States
研究了美国1880-1940年电气化如何通过增加技能女性的市场机会来提高女性劳动参与率，理论模型解释了这一时期女性劳动参与率上升的四分之一。
Abstract This paper revisits the link between electrification and the rise in female labour force participation (LFP), and presents theoretical and empirical evidence showing that electrification triggered a rise in female LFP by increasing market opportunities for skilled women. I formalize my theory in an overlapping generations model and find that my mechanism explains one quarter of the rise in female LFP during the rollout of electricity in the U.S. (1880–1940), and matches the slow decline in female home production hours during this period. I then present micro-evidence supporting my theory using newly digitized data on the early electrification of the U.S.