Is a significant socio-economic structural change a pre-requisite for "inital" fertility decline in the LDCs? Evidence from Thailand based on a multivariate cointegration / vector error correction modelling approach

This study is the first attempt at placing the analysis of fertility in a temporal dynamic framework in the case of a developing Asian economy such as Thailand by binding the relationship between fertility and its determinants within a cointegrated system. The analysis is based on the application of the following recently developed dynamic time series techniques: cointegration, vector error-correction modelling, variance decompositions and the impulse response functions. The results tend to indicate that in the complex dynamic interactions, the importance of the conventional `structural' hypothesis as a significant factor in bringing fertility down in the longer term cannot be denied. However, in the short to longer term, our findings, although not fully supportive of any particular hypothesis, appear to be broadly consistent more with the hypothesis emphasising the critical role played by the `ideational' or diffusion forces along with the demographic variables in ensuring `initial' fertility decline than with the conventional `structural' hypothesis emphasising a significant socio-economic structural change as a pre-condition for `initial' fertility decline. Received: 7 April 1995/Accepted: 15 May 1998     

The effect of maternal employment on teenage childbearing

This paper estimates the effect of a mothers employment on her teenage daughters likelihood of birth. Using data from the United States, the National Education Longitudinal Survey of 1988, the author finds that teenagers with working mothers who attend relatively wealthy schools are more likely (77%) to have a birth compared to teens who attend similar schools but have non-working mothers. In contrast, teenagers with working mothers who attend relatively poor schools are less likely (18%) to have a birth compared to teens who attend similar schools but have non-working mothers.I am indebted to Marcia Carlson, Thomas DeLeire, Angela Fertig, Brian Jacob, Darren Lubotsky, Scott Lynch, Susan Mayer, Sara McLanahan, Robert Michael, German Rodriguez, seminar participants at Princeton University and The University of Chicago, and two anonymous referees for insightful suggestions made on earlier versions of this paper. I also gratefully acknowledge financial support from a Northwestern University/University of Chicago Joint Center for Poverty Research Graduate Fellowship, a Robert R. McCormick Tribune Foundation Graduate Fellowship, the Bendheim-Thoman Center for Research on Child Wellbeing at Princeton University, and the Office of Population Research at Princeton University, which is supported by center grant 5 P30 HD32030 from the NICHD. Responsible editor: Junsen Zhang.     

Intra-household arrangements: How important are they in terms of male-female subjective well-being?

This paper aims to analyze the impact of different intra-household arrangements, defined in terms of income pooling and decision-making responsibilities, on individual subjective well-being in a number of European countries. Using the EU-SILC 2010 module on intra-household sharing of resources and self-assessed health, as a dimension of subjective well-being, we find that the relationship between self-reported health and family arrangements differs by gender and area of decision. The results provide interesting insights on the potential determinants of individual self-assessed health that go beyond the standard ones. In particular, we identify higher levels of males’ and females’ self-assessed health connected to them controlling or sharing financial decisions. Moreover, males’ self-assessed health is positively linked to female making domestic decisions, and negatively if decisions are of financial type; whereas females’ self-assessed health is positively associated to them taking domestic decisions only in households where incomes are not fully pooled. Thus, our findings might be of help for politicians to design the most effective policies intended to improve individual standards of living and to reduce social inequalities.     

The allocation of time and goods in household activities: A test of separability

In this paper, we test for the weak separability hypothesis imposed by the household production model between goods and time inputs used in the production of different commodities. Our data come from a French survey which reports both expenditures and time that households devote to some activities. The results allow us to show that the weak separability assumption cannot be rejected only when households are strongly time constrained. In the opposite case, home time uses are found to be nonseparable. Received: 24 November 1999/Accepted: 16 November 2000     

The allocation and value of time assigned to housework and child-care: An analysis for Switzerland

In this paper, data from the 1997 Swiss Labour Force Survey are used to analyse the allocation and value of time assigned to housework and child-care. It is shown that men's allocation of time to housework and child-care is largely invariant to changes in socio-economic factors. Women's allocation of time to housework and child-care, on the other hand, is shown to depend on several social, economic, and demographic factors. The value of time assigned to housework and child-care is calculated with two market replacement cost methods and three opportunity cost methods. The results show that the value of time assigned to housework and child-care ranges from 27% to 39% and from 5% to 8% of GDP (in 1997), respectively. The value of time assigned to housework and child-care is also calculated for different household structures. Received: 15 April 1999/Accepted: 5 May 2000     

On the surge of altruism

To date, many arguments to explain altruistic behavior were based on `kin selection'. This note shows that evolution can sustain altruism even if the players are not necessarily genetically linked. Depending on the payoff parameters in a prisoner's dilemma game, there can be four distinct types of equilibria, for each of them the proportion of altruists in the population is described. The author is grateful to an anonymous referee for valuable comments. Responsible editor: Alessandro Cigno.     

DISTRIBUTION OF THE LEAST SQUARES ESTIMATOR IN A FIRST-ORDER AUTOREGRESSIVE MODEL

This paper investigates the finite sample distribution of the least squares estimator of the autoregressive parameter in a first-order autoregressive model. A uniform asymptotic expansion for the distribution applicable to both stationary and nonstationary cases is obtained. Accuracy of the approximation to the distribution by a first few terms of this expansion is then investigated. It is found that the leading term of this expansion approximates well the distribution. The approximation is, in almost all cases, accurate to the second decimal place throughout the distribution. In the literature, there exist a number of approximations to this distribution which are specifically designed to apply in some special cases of this model. The present approximation compares favorably with those approximations and in fact, its accuracy is, with almost no exception, as good as or better than these other approximations. Convenience of numerical computations seems also to favor the present approximations over the others. An application of the finding is illustrated with examples.     

Demographic transition and economic growth: Empirical evidence from Greece

Over the past decades, due to a combination of declining fertility rates and rising life expectancies, most industrialized countries have experienced aging populations and low numbers of young populations that may pose economic problems in the future. This paper investigates the relationship first between fertility rate and infant mortality rate and second among demographic changes, real wages and real output in Greece over the period 1960–96. When we control for fluctuations in overall economic activity and the labor market on the bivariate relationship between fertility and mortality rates, the evidence suggests that Granger-causation must exist in at least one direction. The results show that in the long run a decrease in infant mortality rates, taking into consideration economic performance and the labor market, causes a reduction in fertility rates. Also, employing the vector error-correction models, the variance decomposition analysis and the impulse response functions, the empirical results support the endogeneity of fertility choice to infant mortality, the labor market and the growth process. Received: 16 May 1999/Accepted: 18 September 2000     

胸有万卷拿云志 家山独对寂寞心——论李贺《南园十三首》诗主题与创作心态

本文通过对李贺《南园十三首》创作背景、诗歌意境、表现意象的分析和解读,概括全诗表现的作者复杂的思想情感,疏理全诗透露出的主题信息。作为中国中唐时期的重要诗人,李贺仕后辞官之后的心态代表着一个时代文人入世与出世之间的复杂思想情感,尤其是李贺《南园十三首》所体现出来的心态更具有代表意义。