Books and publications received

Efforts to control rampant population growth in sub-Saharan Africa have been stymied by confusion between the potential causes and consequences of high fertility in the region. A controversy has surfaced over the causal direction of the fundamental relationship between human fertility and size of landholdings. Members of one school of thought claim that farm couples modify their fertility behaviour according to the amount of land they own or operate. Yet others argue that the size of landholdings varies as a function of family size (an indicator of the availability of family labour). In the present study we use a two-stage least-squares regression on data from a 1988 survey of 747 farm households in Rwanda to disaggregate and compare the strengths of these two possible paths of influence. The results show that landholdings exert a positive influence on human reproduction, but not the reverse. Moreover, this influence is slightly stronger for couples who own all the land they operated, probably because they have larger incomes from equity in the land. The size of the farm is unrelated to the size of the family's potential farm labour force (measured as the number of household members aged 15–65) or to the husband's total desired number of children. These findings suggest that farm size boosts the number of living children not by creating a demand for more children but by increasing the supply of children through higher natural fertility and child survival.     

Economic determinants of fertility: Results from cross sectional aggregate data

Census data for areal units, SMSA’s in 1960 and cities in 1940, are used to test hypotheses and estimate parameters concerning the influence of a variety of socioeconomic variables on fertility rates of ever married white and nonwhite women aged 25–29, 30–34, 35–44, and 45–49. An economic model of the demand for children is adopted as the theoretical framework. The principal findings are that the market earnings opportunities for wives have an important negative effect on the fertility rate and that male income, representing the income of husbands, has a small but positive effect on fertility. The implication of these results is that changes in economic variables, for example, improvements in the employment opportunities and wages for wives or the establishment of a children’s allowance program, may be expected to affect fertility.     

How female education affects reproductive behavior in urban Pakistan

Although Pakistan remains in a pretransitional stage (contraceptive prevalence of only 11.9% among married women in 1992), urban women with post-primary levels of education are spearheading the gradual move toward fertility transition. Data collected in the city of Karachi in 1987 were used to determine whether the inverse association between fertility and female education is attributable to child supply variables, demand factors, or fertility regulation costs. Karachi, with its high concentration of women with secondary educations employed in professional occupations, has a contraceptive prevalence rate of 31%. Among women married for less than 20 years, a 10-year increment in education predicts that a woman will average two-fifths of a child less than other women in the previous 5 years. Regression analysis identified 4 significant intervening variables in the education-fertility relationship: marriage duration, net family income, formal sector employment, and age at first marriage. Education appears to affect fertility because it promotes a later age at marriage and thus reduces life-time exposure to the risk of childbearing, induces women to marry men with higher incomes (a phenomenon that either reduces the cost of fertility regulation or the demand for children), leads women to become employed in the formal sector (leading to a reduction in the demand for children), and has other unspecified effects on women's values or opportunities that are captured by their birth cohort. When these intervening variables are held constant, women's attitude toward family planning loses its impact on fertility, as do women's domestic autonomy and their expectations of self-support in old age. These findings lend support to increased investments in female education in urban Pakistan as a means of limiting the childbearing of married women. Although it is not clear if investment in female education would have the same effect in rural Pakistan, such action is important from a human and economic development perspective.     

Children as insurance

This paper presents a dynamic model of fertility decisions in which children serve as an incomplete insurance good. The model incorporates uncertainty about future income and the survival of children as well as a discrete representation of the number of children. It contributes to the understanding of the negative relation between fertility and education, shows why parents may demand children even if the return is negative, and explains why fertility might rise with increasing income when income is low and decrease when income is high. Furthermore, the model can account for the decline in fertility when the risk of infant and child mortality decreases. Finally, the implications for empirical tests of the demand for children are also examined. Received: 8 September 1998/Accepted: 9 June 1999     

Economic status proxies in studies of fertility in developing countries: Does the measure matter?

This paper investigates the consequences of using different economic status proxies on the estimated impact of economic status and other determinants of fertility. Using micro survey data from Ghana and Peru, we find that the proxies for income that best predict fertility are a principal components score of the ownership of consumer durable goods and a simple sum of ownership of these durable goods. Furthermore, the choice of the proxy generally has a minor influence on the predicted effects of the control variables. We compare the results from using a restricted set of proxies, such as those available in the Demographic and Health Surveys, with the results obtained using a lengthier set of proxies. Our results suggest implications beyond fertility analyses by providing researchers with an awareness of the sensitivity of microanalyses to the treatment of economic status. Our results also suggest practical recommendations for the collection of survey data.     

New insights into the Far Eastern pattern of mortality

This paper investigates the consequences of using different economic status proxies on the estimated impact of economic status and other determinants of fertility. Using micro survey data from Ghana and Peru, we find that the proxies for income that best predict fertility are a principal components score of the ownership of consumer durable goods and a simple sum of ownership of these durable goods. Furthermore, the choice of the proxy generally has a minor influence on the predicted effects of the control variables. We compare the results from using a restricted set of proxies, such as those available in the Demographic and Health Surveys, with the results obtained using a lengthier set of proxies. Our results suggest implications beyond fertility analyses by providing researchers with an awareness of the sensitivity of microanalyses to the treatment of economic status. Our results also suggest practical recommendations for the collection of survey data.     

Toward a general theory of fertility: A causal modeling approach

A general theory of fertility is derived hypothesizing that the demand for children is primarily an outcome of social psychological processes within the family, subject to certain socioeconomic constraints. Two broad social psychological processes are posited as determinants of fertility. The first suggests that the attitudes or tastes of family members influence the demand for children. The second maintains that the nature of the husband-wife interaction (in terms of power, conflict, decision making, and marital satisfaction) determines family size. Socioeconomic variables, in the form of the normative social structure and social stratification, and economic constraints, such as income and price, are hypothesized to influence fertility through their impact on social psychological processes within the family. The overall theory is tested on two independent samples—one in Ankara, Turkey, the second in Mexico City, Mexico—using a structural equation methodology.     

The sectoral labor supply of married couples in Brazil: Testing the unitary model of household behavior

An assumption of the unitary model of household decision-making is that household members maximize one household utility function. This assumption implies that households pool their income and, therefore, the ownership of nonwage income has no effect on household demand. In this paper, this implication is tested by estimating multi-sector labor supply equations for men and women in Brazil. The results indicate that the unitary model is rejected in the informal and self-employment sectors for men and the formal and informal sectors for women; in these cases own nonwage income has a significantly negative effect on labor supply while spousal nonwage income has no significant effect. Received: 29 December 1997/Accepted: 9 December 1998     

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     

Social status and fertility: A study of a town and three villages in Northwestern Iran

Summary Studies of the relationship between social status and fertility in developing societies have shown diverse results. This study suggests that such findings result in part from problems in the conceptualization of social stratification and social status. In developing societies such as Iran the differentiation of modern and traditional cultural (and occupational) groups within social classes has resulted in the emergence of a dual hierarchy. Measures of social status must therefore reflect these conceptually distinct hierarchies, rather than be limited to linear scales. Figures from a study in a town and three villages in northwest Iran undertaken in 1973 are analyzed. Findings indicate that for women in towns, as social status increases within both traditional and modern occupational hierarchies (husband's occupation) and as measured by income, education and index of modern items, there is a general and almost monotonic decrease in the number of living children, children ever-born, and ideal number of children, with an increase in age at marriage and contraceptive use. The social and cultural homogeneity of the village sample is reflected in the relatively small variations in fertility-related behaviour and attitudes; however, fertility differences between landed and landless villages appear similar to the pattern found in the urban samples. The differences in the fertility behaviour of village and urban women of similar income and educational status indicate that fertility behaviour is related partially to class and partially to status distinctions between urban and rural communities.     

Social status and fertility: A study of a town and three villages in Northwestern Iran

Studies of the relationship between social status and fertility in developing societies have shown diverse results. This study suggests that such findings result in part from problems in the conceptualization of social stratification and social status. In developing societies such as Iran the differentiation of modern and traditional cultural (and occupational) groups within social classes has resulted in the emergence of a dual hierarchy. Measures of social status must therefore reflect these conceptually distinct hierarchies, rather than be limited to linear scales. Figures from a study in a town and three villages in northwest Iran undertaken in 1973 are analyzed. Findings indicate that for women in towns, as social status increases within both traditional and modern occupational hierarchies (husband's occupation) and as measured by income, education and index of modern items, there is a general and almost monotonic decrease in the number of living children, children ever-born, and ideal number of children, with an increase in age at marriage and contraceptive use. The social and cultural homogeneity of the village sample is reflected in the relatively small variations in fertility-related behaviour and attitudes; however, fertility differences between landed and landless villages appear similar to the pattern found in the urban samples. The differences in the fertility behaviour of village and urban women of similar income and educational status indicate that fertility behaviour is related partially to class and partially to status distinctions between urban and rural communities.     

Bargaining over family size: The determinants of fertility in Brazil

Understanding how households make fertility decisions is important to implementing effective policy to slow population growth. Most empirical studies of this decision are based on household models in which men and women are assumed to act as if they have the same preferences for the number of children. However, if men and women have different preferences regarding fertility and are more likely to assert their own preferences as their bargaining power in the household increases, policies to lower fertility rates may be more effectively targeted toward one spouse or the other. In this paper, we test the relevance of the single preferences model by investigating whether men and women's nonwage incomes have the same effects on the number of children in the household. We find that while increases in both the man and woman's nonwage income lower the number of children in the household, an equivalent increase in the woman's income has a significantly stronger effect than the man's. In addition, we find that increases in women's nonwage transfer income have the strongest effects on the fertility decisions of women with low levels of education. The most important policy implication of our results is that policies aimed at increasing the incomes of the least-educated women will be the most effective in lowering fertility rates.     

Post-disaster fertility: Hurricane Katrina and the changing racial composition of New Orleans

Large-scale climate events can have enduring effects on population size and composition. Natural disasters affect population fertility through multiple mechanisms, including displacement, demand for children, and reproductive care access. Fertility effects, in turn, influence the size and composition of new birth cohorts, extending the reach of climate events across generations. We study these processes in New Orleans during the decade spanning Hurricane Katrina. We combine census data, ACS data, and vital statistics data to describe fertility in New Orleans and seven comparison cities. Following Katrina, displacement contributed to a 30% decline in birth cohort size. Black fertility fell, and remained 4% below expected values through 2010. By contrast, white fertility increased by 5%. The largest share of births now occurs to white women. These fertility differences—beyond migration-driven population change—generate additional pressure on the renewal of New Orleans as a city in which the black population is substantially smaller in the disaster’s wake.     

Birth control,income redistribution,and the rate of saving: The case of Mexico

If different groups of people in a low-income society save at different average rates, a program of birth control may affect the aggregate rate of saving by changing the relative shares of income accruing to these groups. A model is outlined in which this process occurs. The only group that saves is profit recipients; peasants and secondary sector employees consume all their income. A decline in fertility leads to a lower demand for food and a lower price of food. This results in a lower money supply price of labor in the secondary sector, and hence greater profits and greater saving. On the other hand, a fertility decline may eventually produce a higher real standard of living among rural workers, hence a higher supply price of secondary sector labor, lower profits and lower saving. These effects are investigated in a simulation of Mexican economic growth with (a) constant high fertility and (b) a declining birth rate such as might occur if a successful national birth control program were instituted. The birth control program results in a higher rate of aggregate saving over the first several decades, and eventually a lower rate of saving once a higher standard of living has been attained.     

The role of intergenerational transfers,land, and education in fertility transition in rural Kenya: the case of Nyeri district

This qualitative study reveals how population pressures, land availability, inheritance norms, and educational opportunities intertwine to influence fertility decline in rural Kenya. Focus group discussions with men and women whose childbearing occurred both before and after the onset of rapid, unexpected fertility transition in Nyeri, Kenya allowed individuals who actually participated in, or witnessed, the fertility transition to “voice” their perceptions as to the mechanisms underlying the transition. Findings suggest that, since land inheritance is a cultural norm, land scarcity and diminishing farm size often influence fertility decision-making and behavior via preferences for fewer children. Further, education does not appear to be the driving cause of fertility behavior change, but rather is adopted as a substitute for land inheritance when land resources are scarce. These findings have implications for our understanding of fertility behavior as well as for improving predictions of fertility transition in other rural sub-Saharan African contexts.     

Fertility effects of child benefits

We exploit the 1996 reform of the German child benefit program to identify the causal effect of heterogeneous child benefits on fertility. While generally the reform increased child benefits, the exact amount of the increase varied by household income and the number of children. We use these heterogeneities to identify their causal effects on fertility in a difference-in-difference setting. We apply the large samples of the German Mikrozensus and the rich data of the German Socio-Economic Panel (SOEP). The reform effects on low-income couples are not statistically significant. We find some support for positive fertility effects for higher as opposed to lower income couples deciding on a second birth.     

Family influences on family size preferences

Several studies have demonstrated important effects of parents’ childbearing behavior on their children’s childbearing preferences and behavior. The study described here advances our understanding of these family influences by expanding the theoretical model to include parental preferences, siblings’ behavior, and changes in children’s preferences through early adulthood. Using intergenerational panel data from mothers and their children, we test the effects of both mothers’ preferences for their own fertility and mothers’ preferences for their children’s fertility. Although both types of maternal preferences influence children’s childbearing preferences, mothers’ preferences for their children’s behavior have the stronger and more proximate effects. Mothers’ preferences continue to influence their children’s preferences through early adulthood; siblings’ fertility is an additional determinant of children’s family size preferences.     

Nuptiality patterns in an agrarian society

Summary The paper deals with the non-European marital pattern and its determinants in an agrarian society before the onset of deliberate fertility decline. A wide range of patterns, from very early and almost universal to late marriage, existed among the populations of European Russia at the end of the nineteenth century. The analysis confirmed a close association, particularly between marital behaviour and socio-economic institutions. Scarcity of labour relative to land, the principle of landholding and land usage according to the amount of labour in the extensive type of family, and an equal-heir inheritance system were found to be conducive to early and common marriage. The spatial differentiation of marital patterns was found to be due to regional modifications in the above institutions, the degree of literacy, size of rural settlements, industrial and urban development, and the sex composition.     

Increasing contraceptive use in Bangladesh: The role of demand and supply factors

This article analyzes the determinants of contraceptive use in Bangladesh, focusing on the roles of demand for additional children and of family planning service supply. Data from the Matlab Family Planning Health Services Project are used to examine the contributions of these factors to the difference in prevalence of modern contraceptive use between the project area and a control area served by the government family planning and health programs. Results of multivariate analysis deriving from the Easterlin synthesis framework show the importance of family planning supply factors in reducing psychic and resource costs of fertility regulation and in activating latent demand for contraception. Demand for birth limiting and for birth spacing emerge as important explanatory factors; demand for birth spacing is greater in the project area, and both demand measures exert a stronger effect on contraceptive behavior in that area.