Westerberg, Thomas () (Department of Economics, Umeå University)
Abstract
This thesis consists of two papers dealing with fertility in Sweden. In paper [1] we discuss possible explanations for the variation in the Swedish fertility. We are primarily interested in economic and social conditions and their impact on the total fertility rate between 1965 and 2003. The period is chosen because of (i) the strong fluctuation in the TFR during the period 1965-2003 and (ii) the positive correlation between fertility and the female labour market participation rate from the early 1980s. This contrasts to earlier periods when the negative relationship was prevalent. The results from the study support a positive effect on fertility from female labour market participation and child allowance while divorces report a negative effect. The model structure that includes short run as well as long run effects seems to be the best specified model of a number of different model structures presented in the paper.
Contrary to the first paper, the second paper [2] has as starting point the number of children born by women in Sweden. A zero inflated Poisson model is applied to analyse if economic and social conditions have any impact on the number of children born by women in Sweden. The study is based upon women who have completed their life-time fertility cycle. The different variables on completed fertility is compared with women who still are in their fertile ages. The results show a difficulty to combine market work and children. The results also support the assumption that women with higher education have fewer children than women with lower education. However, an important conclusion from the study is that the negative correlation between a woman's level of education and her number of children only hold when incomplete fertility is analysed. The relationship between female education and children is not valid when completed fertility is studied.
Download Info
To download:
If you experience problems downloading a file, check if you have the
proper application to
view it first. Information about this may be contained
in the File-Format links below. In case of further problems read
the IDEAS help
page. Note that these files are not on the IDEAS
site. Please be patient as the files may be large.
Publisher Info
Paper provided by Umeå University, Department of Economics in its series Umeå Economic Studies with number
683.
Length: 55 pages Date of creation: 02 Jun 2006 Date of revision: Handle: RePEc:hhs:umnees:0683
Contact details of provider: Postal: Department of Economics, Umeå University, S-901 87 Umeå, Sweden Phone: 090 - 786 61 42 Fax: 090 - 77 23 02 Email: Web page: http://www.econ.umu.se/ More information through EDIRC
For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its listing, contact: (Kjell-Göran Holmberg).
References listed on IDEAS Please report citation or reference errors to , or , if you are the registered author of the cited work, log in to your RePEc Author Service profile, click on "citations" and make appropriate adjustments.: