Projects

Motivated by the existing empirical evidence that day care services increase female labour supply (while  cash support tends to reduce it), this project assesses the potential impact of increasing the provision of day care  services for children aged 1-3 in Hungary.

The project aims to assess all potential costs and benefits, and identify any side effects that should be considered in the allocation of new capacity.

In particular, it will identify the shortages and the geographical distribution of potential gains (mostly related to labour market conditions and the composition of the female labour force) and variations in costs depending on settlement size and location. It will also outline options for securing the necessary funding and motivating  municipalities to increase day care provisions and also deliver high quality service.

Some of the proposals were presented at a seminar of the European Centre in Vienna, on 18 September. The report on the project was published on 9 November 2009 (in Hungarian).