American Economic Review
ISSN 0002-8282 (Print) | ISSN 1944-7981 (Online)
Fertility and Childlessness in the United States
American Economic Review
vol. 105,
no. 6, June 2015
(pp. 1852–82)
Abstract
We develop a theory of fertility, distinguishing its intensive margin from its extensive margin. The deep parameters are identified using facts from the 1990 US Census: (i) fertility of mothers decreases with education; (ii) childlessness exhibits a U-shaped relationship with education; (iii) the relationship between marriage rates and education is hump-shaped for women and increasing for men. We estimate that 2.5 percent of women were childless because of poverty and 8.1 percent because of high opportunity cost of childrearing. Over time, historical trends in total factor productivity and in education led to a U-shaped response in childlessness rates while fertility of mothers decreased. (JEL I20, J13, J16, N31, N32)Citation
Baudin, Thomas, David de la Croix, and Paula E. Gobbi. 2015. "Fertility and Childlessness in the United States." American Economic Review, 105 (6): 1852–82. DOI: 10.1257/aer.20120926Additional Materials
JEL Classification
- I20 Education and Research Institutions: General
- J13 Fertility; Family Planning; Child Care; Children; Youth
- J16 Economics of Gender; Non-labor Discrimination
- N31 Economic History: Labor and Consumers, Demography, Education, Health, Welfare, Income, Wealth, Religion, and Philanthropy: U.S.; Canada: Pre-1913
- N32 Economic History: Labor and Consumers, Demography, Education, Health, Welfare, Income, Wealth, Religion, and Philanthropy: U.S.; Canada: 1913-