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Does Economic Uncertainty Affect the Decision to Bear Children? Evidence from East and West Germany

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  • Sumon Kumar Bhaumik

    ()

  • Jeffrey B. Nugent

Abstract

During their social, political and economic transition, the countries of Central and Eastern Europe experienced significant economic uncertainty. Many of these countries also experienced sharply falling fertility rates. There have been some suggestions that that these two phenomena are linked, i.e., that uncertainty has an impact of the decision to bear children. But the strength and nature of this relationship has not been examined carefully. This paper demonstrates the existence of such a link at the micro level using two different types of uncertainty measures based on GSOEP data from Eastern (and for comparison purposes also Western) Germany for the years 1992-2002. The results suggest that employment uncertainty (but not financial uncertainty) was considerably greater in Eastern Germany during its post-reunification transition than in Western Germany and had a highly nonlinear effect on the likelihood of childbirth. We also show that this uncertainty may have contributed significantly to the sharp drop in East Germany’s total fertility rate in the immediate aftermath of the reunification.

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Bibliographic Info

Paper provided by Centre for Economic Development and Institutions(CEDI), Brunel University in its series CEDI Discussion Paper Series with number 06-06.

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Length: 35 pages
Date of creation: Jul 2006
Date of revision:
Handle: RePEc:edb:cedidp:06-06

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  1. Holger Bonin & Rob Euwals, 2002. "Participation Behavior of East German Women after German Unification," William Davidson Institute Working Papers Series 477, William Davidson Institute at the University of Michigan.
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  3. Tomás Sobotka, 2004. "Is Lowest-Low Fertility in Europe Explained by the Postponement of Childbearing?," Population and Development Review, The Population Council, Inc., vol. 30(2), pages 195-220.
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  7. Witte, James C. & Wagner, Gert G., 1995. "Declining Fertility in East Germany After Unification: A Demographic Response to Socioeconomic Change," EconStor Open Access Articles, ZBW - German National Library of Economics.
  8. Angelika Tölke & Martin Diewald, 2003. "Insecurities in employment and occupational careers and their impact on the transition to fatherhood in Western Germany," Demographic Research, Max Planck Institute for Demographic Research, Rostock, Germany, vol. 9(3), pages 41-68, September.
  9. William A. Darity & Patrick L. Mason, 1998. "Evidence on Discrimination in Employment: Codes of Color, Codes of Gender," Journal of Economic Perspectives, American Economic Association, vol. 12(2), pages 63-90, Spring.
  10. Bhaumik, Sumon Kumar & Nugent, Jeffrey B, 1999. "Analysis of Food Demand in Peru: Implications for Food-Feed Competition," Review of Development Economics, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 3(3), pages 242-57, October.
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  12. T.D. Stanley & Stephen B. Jarrell, 1998. "Gender Wage Discrimination Bias? A Meta-Regression Analysis," Journal of Human Resources, University of Wisconsin Press, vol. 33(4), pages 947-973.
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Cited by:
  1. Brainerd, Elizabeth, 2010. "The Demographic Transformation of Post-Socialist Countries," Working Papers UNU-WIDER Working Paper W, World Institute for Development Economic Research (UNU-WIDER).
  2. Pedro Gete and Paolo Porchia, 2011. "Fertility and Consumption when Having a Child is a Risky Investment," Working Papers gueconwpa~11-11-03, Georgetown University, Department of Economics.
  3. Ariane Pailhé & Anne Solaz, 2012. "The influence of employment uncertainty on childbearing in France: A tempo or quantum effect?," Demographic Research, Max Planck Institute for Demographic Research, Rostock, Germany, vol. 26(1), pages 1-40, January.

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