Relationships Among Market Work, Work Aspirations, and Volunteering: The Case of Retired Women

Abstract

Work by economists offers differing explanations for the volunteer partici pation of women. Mueller argues that women volunteer as a stepping- stone to employment in the market. Blau argues that, because of the constraints women face, volunteer activity serves as a substitute for work in the market. A synthesized view argues that both the substitution and the stepping-stone hypotheses help explain volunteer behavior. This paper examines whether such a synthesized view is consistent with the experi ences of retired women, using data from the Panel Study of Income Dynam ics. The empirical results strongly support the idea that retired women volunteer as a substitute for market work. The results are also consistent with the idea that some women may use volunteer participation as a stepping-stone to work in the market.