This dissertation focuses on the interrelationship of socioeconomic outcomes of women. The first chapter of the dissertation explores the fragility of estimated effects of unilateral divorce laws on divorce rates and concludes that the impact of unilateral divorce laws remains unclear. I also make the methodological point that identification in differences-in-differences research becomes weaker in the presence of dynamics, especially in the presence of unit-specific time trends. The second chapter examines the plateau in U.S. women's labor force participation from the early 1990s to the present. The series of shift-share analyses shows that, for the most part, both the plateau and the earlier upward trend appeared within almost every category broken down by education, marital status, and child-rearing. In the third chapter, I look at the role of teenage women's anticipated future labor force attachment in explaining the upward trend in U.S. women's college-going. Combined with the trend towards higher work expectations of young women across birth cohorts, the results suggest that teenagers' future work expectations may account in part for the upward trends in women's college attendance and completion.
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