Fertility and Financial Development: Evidence from U.S. Counties in the 19th Century

Basso, Alberto; Bodenhorn, Howard; Cuberes, David

doi:10.3386/w20491

Cited by 13 publications

(17 citation statements)

References 32 publications

(71 reference statements)

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“…The study finds that better access to capital markets decreases fertility. Recently, Basso et al (2014) have shown that the presence of a bank and the degree of financial development in a given county are strongly associated with lower children-towomen ratios. Using data for 78 countries over the period 1995-2010, Filoso and Papagni (2015) find that credit availability increases fertility, while access to capital market decreases fertility.…”

Section: Literature Reviewmentioning

confidence: 99%

Fertility and Financial Development in South Asia

et al. 2016

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The paper empirically examines old-age security hypothesis to explain fertility rates in South Asia. Panel data is used for the period 1972-2013 for seven South Asian countries which include Bangladesh, Bhutan, India, Maldives, Nepal, Pakistan and Sri Lanka. The estimated results reveal that in South Asia fertility rate decreases with the increase in financial development. Thus, the findings support old-age security hypothesis that parents use children as financial instruments to secure their old age. This paper validates the theory that the availability of alternative financial tools reduces the incentives of households to have large offspring. Infant mortality is also shown an important factor for high fertility rate in South Asia. This implies that households cover their risk from losing children by producing more children. The results also reveal that fertility rate decreases with the increase in per capita income, which implies that households treat children as inferior good in this region. In other words, households prefer quality of children over quantity of children when their income level increases. The results have also shown that fertility decreases with the increase in education, urbanization, agriculture productivity and industrialization. The study has some important policy implications.

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Section: Literature Reviewmentioning

confidence: 99%

Fertility and Financial Development in South Asia

et al. 2016

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“…At lower quantiles such as τ = 0.10 and 0.25, the FLPR is not rejecting the null hypothesis, however, the FLFP is giving a negative relationship toward the FR after reaching quantile τ = 0.50 onward. The female labor participation is getting attention in recent studies among South Asian countries, and most of the finding show that fertility rate decline as increase of financial development and female labor force participation (Filoso & Papagni, 2015;Idris et al, 2018); Fox et al, 2018;Basso, Bodenhorn, & Cuberes, 2014;Hafner & Mayer-Foulkes, 2013). For example, Lee et al (2012) highlighted female labor's involvement and FR in women employment with a negative relationship effect.…”

Section: Max Mean Skewnessmentioning

confidence: 99%

Does financial development influence fertility rate in South Asian economies? An empirical insight

2020

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The purpose of this paper is to empirically investigate the effect of financial development on fertility rate along with other major indicators in select South Asian economies over the period 1990-2016. The study uses various statistical techniques such as Johansen-Fisher panel co-integration approaches are employed to examine the long-run relationship among the variables and for statistically quantile regression is employed. The study finds that the variables under consideration are found to be cointegrated, that is, they are found to be having a long-term relationship. By using three different measures of financial sector development, it is also observed that financial sector development has invariably led to a declining fertility rate in the south Asian region during the study period.

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“…The data also found that self-financing expansion of social security reduces fertility and rises household saving. Another convincing evidence on old-age hypothesis done by Basso et al (2014) found that the presence of bank and developed local financial market are strongly associated with lower children-to-women ratios. This was observed using the data from 196 counties in the Northeastern United States (Connecticut, Delaware, Massachusetts, New Hampshire, New Jersey, New York, Pennsylvania, Rhode Island, and Vermont) in the 19th century.…”

Section: Fertility and Financial Developmentmentioning

confidence: 92%

Does Financial Development Contribute to Fertility Decline in Developed and Developing Countries?

Idris¹,

Habibullah²,

Mustafa³

2021

IJARBSS

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The "old-age security" hypotheses propose that financial market can affect individuals' decision to have less or more children. In previous literature, children are considered an asset and investment at low level of financial development that could bring returns and security during old age. Nevertheless, at higher level of financial development, individuals have more access to fund and opportunity for investment during old age and as a result the demand for children is less. Furthermore, increase in female labour participation rate in the economic sectors will also discourage them to have more children. The development of commercial bank and non-banking financial institutions (NBFIs) has broadened credit accessibility and investment opportunity to household over the last decades. Well-developed financial system facilitates firms to access to the credit market and enhanced production efficiency and promote increases in wages in the modern market. Household have choice to move from traditional market (low wages, high fertility rate) to work in modern sector (high wages, low fertility rate). The purpose of the study is to investigate the impact of financial development on fertility for selected developed and developing countries. We employ generalized method of moment (GMM) model using annual data from 2005 to 2011. Our results found that financial development and fertility has inverse relationship for both developed and developing countries.

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Fertility and Financial Development: Evidence from U.S. Counties in the 19th Century

Cited by 13 publications

References 32 publications

Fertility and Financial Development in South Asia

Fertility and Financial Development in South Asia

Does financial development influence fertility rate in South Asian economies? An empirical insight

Does Financial Development Contribute to Fertility Decline in Developed and Developing Countries?

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