We study the relationship between education and fertility, exploiting compulsory schooling reforms in Europe as source of exogenous variation in education. Using data from 8 European countries, we assess the causal effect of education on the number of biological kids and the incidence of childlessness. We find that more education causes a substantial decrease in childlessness and an increase in the average number of children per woman. Our findings are robust to a number of falsification checks and we can provide complementary empirical evidence on the mechanisms leading to these surprising results.
More Schooling, More Children: Compulsory Schooling and Fertility in Europe / M. Fort; N. Schneeweis; R. Winter-Ebmer. - ELETTRONICO. - (2011), pp. 1-44.
More Schooling, More Children: Compulsory Schooling and Fertility in Europe
FORT, MARGHERITA;
2011
Abstract
We study the relationship between education and fertility, exploiting compulsory schooling reforms in Europe as source of exogenous variation in education. Using data from 8 European countries, we assess the causal effect of education on the number of biological kids and the incidence of childlessness. We find that more education causes a substantial decrease in childlessness and an increase in the average number of children per woman. Our findings are robust to a number of falsification checks and we can provide complementary empirical evidence on the mechanisms leading to these surprising results.I documenti in IRIS sono protetti da copyright e tutti i diritti sono riservati, salvo diversa indicazione.