Paper on Birth Control Access by Olivier Marie and Esmee Zwiers in The Review of Economics and Statistics
Study with new causal evidence on the “power” of oral contraceptives in shaping women's lives and the crucial role of medical gatekeepers in limiting access by research fellows Olivier Marie (Erasmus University Rotterdam) and Esmée Zwiers (University of Amsterdam) is forthcoming in The Review of Economics and Statistics.
In their paper "Religious Barriers to Birth Control Access," they present new causal evidence on the “power” of oral contraceptives in shaping women's lives, leveraging the 1970 liberalization of the Pill for minors in the Netherlands and demand- and supply-side religious preferences that affected Pill take-up. They analyze administrative data to demonstrate that, after Pill liberalization, minors from less conservative areas were more likely to delay fertility/marriage and to accumulate human capital in the long run. Finally, they show how these large effects were eliminated for women facing a higher share of gatekeepers—general practitioners and pharmacists—who were opposed to providing the Pill on religious grounds.
Article Citation
Olivier MarieEsmée Zwiers; Religious Barriers to Birth Control Access. The Review of Economics and Statistics 2025; doi: https://doi.org/10.1162/rest.a.281