A Labour Supply Function for Married Women in Great Britain

In postwar Britain, as in other countries, there has been a substantial rise in female labour force participation.1 An analysis by marital status shows that this aggregate rise is due to increased participation by married women, since single and widowed or divorced women have shown stable or falling participation rates in the period 1951-1971. Disaggregation by age group reveals that for married women the fastest increases have occurred for the 45-59 age range (see Table 1), but there have been substantial increases at all ages.