Impact of foreign domestic workers on the fertility decision of households: evidence from Hong Kong

A potential solution to low fertility is the employment of foreign domestic workers (FDWs), who substitute child-rearing and housework duties, thus reducing child-rearing costs. Recent studies argue that the flow of low-skilled foreign workers into the childcare sector influences fertility choice. However, these studies mainly use the availability of FDWs in the local area as the causal inference and focus on Western countries, making it difficult to identify individual direct effects or generalize the findings to other countries. To bridge this research gap and examine the impacts, this study uses household data from the Hong Kong census. Employing ordinary least squares, the inverse probability weighted regression adjustment, and the instrumental variable approach, we find that households that employ live-in FDWs give birth to more children. Moreover, the heterogeneous analysis reveals that women's greater proportional contribution to household income has a positive impact on households' fertility response after employing the FDWs.

The impact of high speed internet on reproductive behavior in Russia

The paper examines influence of high-speed (broadband) Internet on fertility choice analyzed Russian panel data based on RLMS-HSE from 2014 to 2018. Using an instrumental variables strategy that exploits variations of broadband Internet access for households we find that determined broadband internet use leads to a positive effect on fertility for women of older reproductive age (from 25 to 49) and birth of second and further child is more affected. We attribute this effect to the ability of teleworking and building a better work-life balance. From our results this mechanism is relevant only for women with secondary and higher vocational education, that are more likely to work in professions with a higher probability of telework.

The Fall in Global Fertility: A Quantitative Model

Over the past six decades, fertility rates have fallen dramatically in most middle- and low-income countries. To analyze these developments, we study a quantitative model of endogenous human capital and fertility choice, augmented to allow for social norms over family size. We parametrize the model using data on socioeconomic variables and information on funding for population-control policies aimed at affecting social norms and improving access to contraceptives. We simulate the implementation of population-control policies to gauge their contribution to the decline in fertility. We find that policies aimed at altering family-size norms accelerated and strengthened the decline in fertility, which would have otherwise taken place much more gradually. (JEL J10, J13, J18, J24, O15, Z13)

The Elasticity of Intergenerational Substitution, Parental Altruism, and Fertility Choice

Dynastic models common in macroeconomics use a single parameter to control the willingness of individuals to substitute consumption both intertemporally, or across periods, and intergenerationally, or across parents and their children. This article defines the concept of elasticity of intergenerational substitution (EGS), and extends a standard dynastic model in order to disentangle the EGS from the EIS, or elasticity of intertemporal substitution. A calibrated version of the model lends strong support to the notion that the EGS is significantly larger than one. In contrast, estimates of the EIS suggests that it is at most one. What disciplines the identification is the need to match empirically plausible fertility rates for the U.S. We illustrate the potential role of the EGS in macroeconomics.

Social Science Genetics and Fertility

To what extent do genes influence the age at which you have your first child and the total number of children that you have? Does the (social) environment change genetic effects on fertility? Do genes lead to spurious associations between life outcomes such as education and age at first birth? The social sciences have been reticent to integrate a genetic approach to the study of fertility choice and behaviour, resulting in theories and findings that are largely socially deterministic. This dissertation investigates genetic and environmental influences on human fertility—aswell as their interplay—using both twin data as well as molecular genetic data of more than 31,000 genotyped individuals from 6 countries.