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The impact of the two child policy on China's fertility rate

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  • Seunghun Chung

    (The Ohio State University)

Abstract

I investigate the impact of China's family policy reform on its birth rate. In 2016 the Chinese government relaxed its one-child policy into a two-children policy due concerns of a rapidly aging population, so all Chinese women were permitted to have two children from then onwards. Using the synthetic control method, I find that this reform increased the birth rate in 2016 and 2017 but declined back to previous levels after 2017. This implies that China's birth rate may not increase in the long run by mere relaxation of current anti-natalist family policy.

Suggested Citation

  • Seunghun Chung, 2022. "The impact of the two child policy on China's fertility rate," Economics Bulletin, AccessEcon, vol. 42(2), pages 1062-1068.
    • Handle: RePEc:ebl:ecbull:eb-21-00826
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    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Mark R. Rosenzweig & Junsen Zhang, 2009. "Do Population Control Policies Induce More Human Capital Investment? Twins, Birth Weight and China's "One-Child" Policy," The Review of Economic Studies, Review of Economic Studies Ltd, vol. 76(3), pages 1149-1174.
    2. Hai Fang & Karen Eggleston & John Rizzo & Richard Zeckhauser, 2013. "Jobs and kids: female employment and fertility in China," IZA Journal of Labor & Development, Springer;Forschungsinstitut zur Zukunft der Arbeit GmbH (IZA), vol. 2(1), pages 1-25, December.
    3. Abadie, Alberto & Diamond, Alexis & Hainmueller, Jens, 2010. "Synthetic Control Methods for Comparative Case Studies: Estimating the Effect of California’s Tobacco Control Program," Journal of the American Statistical Association, American Statistical Association, vol. 105(490), pages 493-505.
    4. Stuart Basten & Quanbao Jiang, 2015. "Fertility in China: An uncertain future," Population Studies, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 69(sup1), pages 97-105, April.
    5. Qin, Xuezheng & Zhuang, Castiel Chen & Yang, Rudai, 2017. "Does the one-child policy improve children's human capital in urban China? A regression discontinuity design," Journal of Comparative Economics, Elsevier, vol. 45(2), pages 287-303.
    6. Avraham Ebenstein, 2010. "The "Missing Girls" of China and the Unintended Consequences of the One Child Policy," Journal of Human Resources, University of Wisconsin Press, vol. 45(1).
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    JEL classification:

    • J1 - Labor and Demographic Economics - - Demographic Economics

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