Do more-schooled women have fewer children and delay childbearing? Evidence from a sample of US twins

Abstract

Using data on MZ (monozygotic, identical) female twins from the Minnesota Twin Registry, we estimate the causal effect of schooling on completed fertility, probability of being childless and age at first birth, using the within-MZ twins methodology. We find strong cross-sectional associations between schooling and the fertility outcomes and some evidence that more schooling causes women to have fewer children and delay childbearing, though not to the extent that interpreting cross-sectional associations as causal would imply. Our conclusions are robust when taking account of (1) endogenous within-twin pair schooling differences due to reverse causality and (2) measurement error in schooling. We also investigate possible mechanisms and find that the effect of women's schooling on completed fertility is not mediated through husband's schooling but rather through age at first marriage. Abstract:Using data on MZ (monozygotic, identical)

Is the Association Between Education and Fertility Postponement Causal? The Role of Family Background Factors

“…Neiss et al (2002) and Rodgers et al (2008) showed for the United States and Denmark respectively that the association between education and age at first birth is completely absorbed by latent family influences. Nisén and Myrskylä (2013) and Amin and Behrman (2014), however, found a significant link between both outcomes net of family influences. Our study suggests that a causal effect of education on age at first birth exists but that it is small and therefore might have remained undetected in former investigations.…”

“…Although within-twin models have a long history in economics (Rosenzweig and Wolpin 1980) and psychology/behavioral genetics (D'Onofrio et al 2013;Neale and Cardon 1992), they have seldom been applied in demography (Amin and Behrman 2014). A comparison of the OLS and the within-twin approach indicates the extent to which family background leads to a spurious association between education and age at first birth.…”

“…Second, previous investigations of the causal link between education and age at first birth in family designs showed mixed results, some confirming a causal relationship (Amin and Behrman 2014;Nisén et al 2013) and some not (Neiss et al 2002;Rodgers et al 2008).…”

“…However, these studies also used different analytical strategies, applying within-identical twin models (Amin and Behrman 2014), standard behavior genetics models (Nisén et al 2013), and Education, Fertility Postponement, and Causality 6 complex structural equation models (SEM) (Neiss et al 2002;Rodgers et al 2008). To decipher this puzzle, we present within-identical twin models as well as the ACE-beta model, which simultaneously estimates the causal effect and quantifies family environmental and genetic influences on the education-fertility relationship in a parsimonious SEM (Kohler et al 2011).…”

The Quiet Revolution and the Family: Gender Composition of Tertiary Education and Early Fertility Patterns

“…6 There is much research on the e¤ect of schooling on fertility, e.g., Amin and Behrman (2014), but this work does not ask about the fertility e¤ects of gender composition of study groups within education levels.…”