Fertility and desired fertility: Longitudinal evidence from Thailand

Summary The validity and usefulness of 'desired additional children' and 'ideal family size' as predictors of fertility are analysed in this paper on the basis of longitudinal survey data from Thailand. First, the extent of measurement error in these variables is considered, and it is concluded that the error variance and the true variance are of similar orders of magnitude. Secondly, the changes in attitudes subsequent to births and deaths of children are investigated. It is found that the number of additional children desired is decreased by births and increased by deaths, but less than would be expected if 'desired additional children' represented an unchanging target family size. 'Ideal family size' is almost unaffected by births and deaths. Thirdly, the contribution of attitudinal variables to behavioural models is examined. It is found that desired fertility is explained no better than fertility in a standard economic model. A birth function separating desired children from identifiable physiological factors as explanatory variables indicated that the former was just significant. A model of contraceptive acceptance also found desired fertility to be a significant determinant. Thus, desired fertility can be successfully integrated into behavioural models. But on the whole, its explanatory power was weak, and it was concluded that the independent use of this variable does not significantly improve on models which relate fertility to socio-economic variables directly.     

The labor market effects of national health insurance: evidence from Taiwan

This paper investigates the impacts of national health insurance on the labor market, by considering the case of Taiwan, which implemented national health insurance in March 1995. Taiwan’s national health insurance is financed by premiums, which are proportional to an employee’s salary. These premiums may introduce distortions to the labor market. Based on repeated cross-sections of individual data we find that, on average, private sector employees’ work hours declined relative to their public sector counterparts, whereas their relative wage rates were almost unchanged with the introduction of national health insurance. The results suggest that neither private sector employers nor their employees were able to shift their premium burden to each other.      

HIV and fertility in Africa: first evidence from population-based surveys

The historical pattern of the demographic transition suggests that fertility declines follow mortality declines, followed by a rise in human capital accumulation and economic growth. The HIV/AIDS epidemic threatens to reverse this path. We utilize recent rounds of the demographic and health surveys that link an individual woman’s fertility outcomes to her HIV status based on testing. The data allow us to distinguish the effect of own positive HIV status on fertility (which may be due to lower fecundity and other physiological reasons) from the behavioral response to higher mortality risk, as measured by the local community HIV prevalence. We show that although HIV-infected women have significantly lower fertility, local community HIV prevalence has no significant effect on noninfected women’s fertility.     

Seasonality of fertility: New evidence

This paper presents evidence that the seasonal pattern of American fertility applies to nonwhites as well as whites. The patterns are also changing in the same way over time: the summer trough in births is shrinking in magnitude, and the spread of airconditioning, reducing the heat of summer, can explain this shrinkage. The summer hypothesis is further buttressed by evidence, for the total population, that summer temperature extremes can explain a significant portion of the variation around the seasonal trend, in both the North and South. These temperature-induced variations appear to be offset within seven months of their occurrence.This research was supported in part by a grant from the National Institute of Child Health and Human Development. Dennis Sullivan made a number of valuable critical comments on an earlier draft of this paper. Valuable research assistance was provided by Amy Powell and Robert Schoeni.     

The effects of infant mortality on fertility revisited: new evidence from latin america

In this paper, we examine empirical evidence for a relation between infant and child mortality and fertility in Latin American countries from 1920 to 1990. We investigate the relation at several levels of aggregation and evaluate the extent to which evidence at one level is consistent with evidence at other levels. We first examine aggregate cross-country information over several decades, a type of data typically used in past research on the topic. We also examine yearly series of births, deaths, infant deaths, and socioeconomic indicators for selected countries to track the association between short-term fluctuations in fertility and infant mortality. Finally, we use micro-level data from the Demographic and Health Surveys (DHS) to assess the relation between fertility and child mortality from individual reproductive histories. The evidence we assemble from these different data sets is remarkably consistent and suggests small positive effects of infant mortality on fertility. These effects, however, may be too small to support the hypothesis that changes in child mortality are of more than modest importance in the process of fertility decline in Latin America in the late twentieth century.     

Husband,sons and the fertility gap: evidence from India

Journal of Population Research - A fertility gap—the difference between a woman’s ideal number of children and her actual number of children—is prevalent in both directions. We...     

The role of contraceptive supply and demand in Mexican fertility decline: evidence from a microdemographic study

This paper uses retrospective life history data to assess the impact of family planning services on contraceptive use in a rural Mexican township. Between 1960 and 1990 contraceptive use rose and fertility declined dramatically. Both contraceptive supply and demand factors were influential in these trends. The start of the government-sponsored family planning programme in the late 1970s was associated with a sharp rise in female sterilization and use of the IUD. However, once we controlled for the changing socio-economic and demographic characteristics of the sample, the presence of family planning services had no significant effect on the likelihood that women used modern reversible methods compared to traditional methods. Men and women expressed concerns about the safety of modern methods such as the pill and the IUD. Efforts to increase modern contraceptive use should place greater emphasis on communicating the safety of these methods and improving the quality of services.     

The unintended effects of cash transfers on fertility: evidence from the Safe Motherhood Scheme in India

India launched the Safe Motherhood Scheme (Janani Suraksha Yojana or JSY) in 2005 in response to persistently high maternal and child mortality rates. JSY provides a cash incentive to socioeconomically disadvantaged women for childbirth at health facilities. This study explores some unintended consequences of JSY. Using data from two large household surveys, we examine a policy variation that exploits the differential incentive structure under JSY across states and population subgroups. We find that JSY may have resulted in a 2.5–3.5 percentage point rise in the probability of childbirth or pregnancy over a 3-year period in states already experiencing high population growth.     

The density of social networks and fertility decisions: evidence from south nyanza district, kenya

Demographers have argued increasingly that social interaction is an important mechanism for understanding fertility behavior. Yet it is still quite uncertain whether social learning or social influence is the dominant mechanism through which social networks affect individuals' contraceptive decisions. In this paper we argue that these mechanisms can be distinguished by analyzing the density of the social network and its interaction with the proportion of contraceptive users among network partners. Our analyses indicate that social learning is most relevant with high market activity; in regions with only modest market activity, however, social influence is the dominant means by which social networks affect women's contraceptive use.     

The transition to lower fertility in the West Bank and Gaza Strip: evidence from recent surveys

Using recent data from three national-level surveys conducted in 1995, 2000, and 2004, we provide evidence that Palestinian fertility rates in the West Bank and Gaza Strip, historically among the highest in the world, began to slow especially in the West Bank, but stalled in Gaza during the recent Intifada. The TFR in the early 2000s was 4.6 per woman, down from 6.2 a decade earlier. However, most of the decline in Gaza’s fertility appears to have taken place during the early 1990s, before the onset of the second Intifada. In Gaza, the TFR decreased from 7.4 to 5.7 during the 1990s, but changed only slightly to 5.6 during the second Intifada period. Surprisingly, contraceptive prevalence has not changed during these years, and the transition to lower fertility was mainly due to changes in nuptiality. Demand for children remains high, although there is evidence of unmet need for contraception. The continuing conflict and worsening economic situation provide clues to the persistence of high fertility among Palestinian women.

Disease risk and fertility: evidence from the HIV/AIDS pandemic

A fundamental question about human behavior is whether fertility responds to disease risk. The standard economic theory of household fertility decision-making generates ambiguous predictions, and the response has large implications for human welfare. We examine the fertility response to the HIV/AIDS pandemic using national household survey data from 14 sub-Saharan African countries. Instrumental variable (IV) estimates using distance to the origin of the pandemic suggest that HIV/AIDS has increased the total fertility rate (TFR) and the number of surviving children. These results rekindle the debate about the fertility response to disease risk, particularly the HIV/AIDS pandemic, and highlight the question of whether the HIV/AIDS pandemic has reduced GDP per capita.     

Deliberate birth spacing before the fertility transition in Europe: evidence from nineteenth-century Belgium

Many scholars have argued that deliberate birth spacing may have played a role before and during the modern fertility transition. There are good historical and theoretical reasons for this view, but it has proved to be hard to demonstrate convincingly that birth intervals were in fact partly determined by attempts at deliberate fertility control. This paper suggests a method of securing evidence on the issue for married couples. The method is applied to three cohorts living in a Belgian town in the nineteenth century. The findings indicate that, even before the fertility transition, couples in the working class were controlling their fertility by deliberate spacing.     

The heterogeneous effects of socioeconomic and cultural factors on fertility preferences: evidence from Rwanda and Kenya

Journal of Population Research - This research uses the latest Demographic and Health Surveys to investigate the heterogeneity of effects of socioeconomic and cultural factors on fertility...     

The effect of longevity on schooling and fertility: evidence from the Brazilian Demographic and Health Survey

This paper presents microevidence on the effect of adult longevity on schooling and fertility. Higher longevity is systematically associated with higher schooling and lower fertility. The paper looks at the 1996 Brazilian Demographic and Health Survey and constructs an adult longevity variable based on the mortality history of the respondent's family. Families with histories of high adult mortality in previous generations have systematically higher fertility and lower schooling. These effects are not associated with omitted variables and remain unchanged after a large array of factors is accounted for (demographic characteristics, family-specific child mortality, regional development, socioeconomic status, etc.).

The demand for children in Arab countries: evidence from panel and count data models

This paper provides empirical evidence on fertility determinants in Arab countries. Adopting a macro and micro framework and exploiting panel and count data models the paper estimates the impact of cultural and economic factors on the demand for children. The results obtained strongly support the hypothesis that cross-country heterogeneity buttresses differentiated fertility and that female education mitigates high fertility. Child mortality and parent‘s preferences for sons positively affect fertility. By and large, demand for children is price and income inelastic. Received: 30 May 1995 /Accepted: 19 February 1998     

Public policy and the total fertility rate: cross-sectional evidence from the LDCs

A framework developed by Easterlin for the analysis of fertility in developing societies is modified and then tested using a sample of 65 less-developed countries. The focus is on assessing the impact of public policy on the national fertility rate. Public policy is reflected in the average levels of education and health in the population and in the condition of the national family planning program. To test for threshold effects with respect to socioeconomic development, the sample is divided on the basis of the infant mortality rate. Fertility rates in those nations characterized by high infant mortality are likely to be determined more by conditions of natural fertility. Those nations with lower infant mortality, and hence greater socioeconomic development, are more likely to exhibit deliberate fertility control. The results of the regression analysis do suggest that different factors influence the national fertility rate depending upon the stage of development. For the least-developed nations, the secondary school enrollment rate, an indicator of the extent of economic mobility, and the ratio of school age children to teachers, a proxy for the national commitment to human capital formation, are important. For the more advanced of the LDCs, adult literacy and the infant mortality rate seem to predominate. For all the developing nations, however, the results confirm the importance of strong family planning programs. The paper concludes with a discussion of the policy implications of the research.