Nudging As American Obsession but European Reality: The Case of Paternal Care Incentives from a Theoretical and Normative Perspective

This paper considers the "nudge" literature in American behavioral economics and compares it to the actual incentives that exist in EU countries concerning paternal leave. Increasingly, European countries are adding to gender-neutral "parental leave" policies specific "daddy quotas" that require a certain amount of the leave to be taken specifically by fathers.  There is some evidence that these policies are shifting norms about the appropriateness of fathers participating in primary childcare.  In the US, by contrast, the differences between men's and women's participation in childcare remains significantly unbalanced, and norms remain largely unchanged about childcare being the responsibility of mothers. As a political theorist, I consider the normative deficit of the "nudge" literature and argue that EU countries have been much more successful at shifting normative values about the sexual division of labor, and suggest that "nudges" are inadequate as a public policy approach.