We propose to link together three aspects of work and family life that have typically been studied separately: shift work, child care, and fertility expectations. Our primary goals are: (1) to describe the interrelationships between these variables for a significant population of Americans: young dual-earner couples with children, and (2) theory development; that is, the generation and testing of hypotheses, drawing upon a guiding thesis and the existing literature of each of these areas. The analysis will be based on an existing data set: the 1984 wave of the Youth Cohort, which is part of the National Longitudinal Survey. In 1984, this cohort, which includes both men and women, was aged 19 to 26. We shall select from this sample of over 12,000 respondents a subsample of married people with children who report that both they and their spouses are currently employed (i.e., dual earners). We estimate there will be about 300-400 male respondent dual-earner couples and about 700-800 female respondent dual-earner couples. Our guiding thesis is as follows: various job, school, family, and environmental factors are associated with the shift work status of husbands and wives and the extent to which their work hours overlap. Work schedules of spouses, in turn, are related to the types of child care arrangements they make and their perceptions of child care as a constraint on employment. Child care use and perceived constraints, in turn, are related to fertility expectations. There is, then, a relationship between work schedules of spouses and their fertility expectations, but child care use and perceived constraints are important intervening factors. We also posit that there may be interesting differences in the nature or strength of these relationships by sex (husbands versus wives) and for the following subgroups: advantaged whites, disadvantaged whites, blacks and Hispanics. Numerous relationships will be analyzed using multivariate techniques.
