This dissertation compares two countries in which the level of fertility is very different and explores to which extent these differences can be explained with current family policy measures and in particular with measures that permit women to conciliate employment and family life. The two countries have indeed in common to devote proportionally the same part of their GDP to families, but they support differently the conciliation between work and family life. While in France the measures and the childcare facilities for children below three allow women to resume work quickly after a birth, it's a long career interruption which is supported in Hungary. The measures, inherited from the era of state-socialism, have an important impact on the duration of career interruptions of women: after a birth, the mean length of these interruptions is about 4.7 years. At the meantime people's mentality supports this organisation of family life after a birth since social norms claim for maternal childcare until the age of three. Yet, these norms are changing and younger women are more permissive and wish to resume work more quickly. The almost obligation to take up parental leave after a birth means that women's employment status has a significant effect on the realisation of fertility intentions in Hungary. In France on the contrary, as a result of the more neutral family policy, employment status has less effect on the realisation of fertility intentions, and moreover, these intentions are more often realised than in Hungary.
