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on Demographic Economics |
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Issue of 2012‒04‒17
twelve papers chosen by Clarence Nkengne Tsimpo University of Montreal and World Bank Group |
| By: | Brishti Guha (School of Economics, Singapore Management University) |
| Abstract: | I show how an interaction between the imbalance of the sex ratio and the jump in divorce rates after a liberalization in divorce laws can obtain in a model of marriage market matching with non-transferable utility. If sex ratios are more unbalanced, the size of the jump in divorce rates following a transition from mutual consent to unilateral divorce will be larger. This works through two interacting sources of asymmetry, the first in remarriage odds between the sexes, the second in the impact of divorce law regime on the ease of obtaining a divorce. |
| Keywords: | Divorce, sex ratios, marriage market, imbalance, matching, non-transferable utility. |
| JEL: | J12 K36 D82 |
| Date: | 2012–01 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:siu:wpaper:19-2012&r=dem |
| By: | Stopnitzky, Yaniv |
| Abstract: | Female bargaining power in rural Haryana, as in much of northern India, is constrained by widespread discrimination against women. In recent years, however, women successfully demand private sanitation facilities from potential husbands as a precondition for marriage. I study this manifestation of bargaining power by modeling latrine adoption as an investment that males can make to improve their desirability on the marriage market, and I show that increasing proportions of females with strong sanitation preferences drive male investment in toilets. Moreover, I demonstrate women’s ability to secure latrines increases when they are relatively scarce in a marriage market. I test these predictions empirically by studying a sanitation program in Haryana, India, known colloquially as “No Toilet, No Bride”. Using a triple difference empirical strategy based on households with and without marriageable boys, in Haryana and comparison states, before and after program exposure, I provide evidence that male investment in sanitation increased by 15% due to the program. Further, the program effect is four times larger in marriage markets where women are scarce (26%) as compared to marriage markets where women are abundant (6%). These results suggest the relative scarcity of women in Haryana has, conditional on women surviving to marriageable age, improved the ability of the remaining women to secure valuable goods. |
| Keywords: | intrahousehold bargaining; marriage market; sex ratio; sanitation; India |
| JEL: | Q5 O13 J12 D1 O12 |
| Date: | 2012–02–15 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:pra:mprapa:37841&r=dem |
| By: | Atanda, Akinwande A.; Aminu, Salaudeen B.; Alimi, Olorunfemi Y. |
| Abstract: | The precise relationship between population growth and per capita income has been inconclusive in the literature and the nexus has been found not clearly explain the determinants of rapid population growth in developing countries that lacks fertility control and management framework. This forms the rationale for this study to access the trend of factors that influence rapid population growth in developing countries between 1980 and 2010. This paper examined the comparative trend review of population growth determinants between developing countries (Bangladesh, Ethiopia, Indonesia, Mexico and Nigeria) and developed nations (Germany and United States). The trend analysis revealed that fertility rate, crude death rate, birth rate, mortality rate, and life expectancy are the major determinants of rapid population growth rate, while youth dependency ratio of young people below age 15 has also been attributed as one of the leading causes of population growth and growth threat in developing countries. However, the analysis further indicated that excluding Mexico from the Upper Middle Income group, developed economies (United State and Germany) with large population size have a higher real economic well-being as measured by the Real GNI per capita, compared with selected developing economies in the world. The study then proffered the need for population control framework and provision of essential infrastructures for the rapid growing population size in developing countries in order to enhance their welfare. |
| Keywords: | Population Growth; Income Growth; Health Status; Fertility; Mortality; Developing Countries; Developed Nations; Income Group |
| JEL: | O1 I0 C40 D60 O4 |
| Date: | 2012–03–04 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:pra:mprapa:37966&r=dem |
| By: | Julia Anna Matz (Institute for International Integration Studies and Department of Economics, Trinity College Dublin) |
| Abstract: | This paper investigates the role of individual productivity in the matching process of spouses and in the allocation of resources among them, focusing on a polygamous setting. Using a simple game theoretical approach I show that highly productive wives are more strongly demanded in the marriage market than less productive ones so that a selection into being the first wife with respect to productivity takes place. Furthermore, productivity is positively associated with a woman's share of family income to be spent on consumption and investment, due to greater contributions to family income and larger incomes when single. The findings are empirically supported by a positive relationship between indicators of female productivity, women's levels of seniority among wives and their children's educational outcomes in rural Ethiopia. |
| Keywords: | Polygamy, Rank, Intrahousehold Allocation |
| JEL: | D13 J12 O12 |
| Date: | 2011–12 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:iis:dispap:iiisdp390&r=dem |
| By: | Parlow, Anton |
| Abstract: | The exposure to violence in utero and early in life has adverse impacts on children's age-adjusted height (z-scores). Using the experience of the Kashmir insurgency, I find that stress during pregnancy and the limited access to health services in more conflict-affected regions of Jammu and Kashmir have different regional and cohort effects. Furthermore, the link between children's health at birth, mother's health during pregnancy, and children's height in the context of negative exogenous shocks has not been fully researched yet. Children small at birth and children with anemic mothers are shorter for their age. Overall, children more affected by the insurgency are 0.9 to 1.4 standard deviations smaller compared with children less affected by the insurgency. The effect is stronger for children who were born during peaks in violence. Gender differences are small. Finally, a robust finding in the health literature is that shorter children perform worse in schools, in jobs, and are sicker throughout their life. Here, children already negatively affected by the insurgency in their height, are also more likely to be sick in the two weeks prior to the survey. |
| Keywords: | Armed Conflicts; Health; Children |
| JEL: | I12 O12 |
| Date: | 2012–03–31 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:pra:mprapa:38033&r=dem |
| By: | Katsushi S. Imai (Economics, School of Social Sciences, University of Manchester, UK & Research Institute for Economics & Business Administration (RIEB), Kobe University, Japan); Samuel Kobina Annim (Economics, School of Social Sciences, University of Manchester, UK & Department of Economics, University of Cape Coast, Ghana); Raghav Gaiha (Faculty of Management Studies, University of Delhi, India); Veena S. Kulkarni (Arkansas State University, USA) |
| Abstract: | This study investigates whether mother's empowerment or relative bargaining power affects children's nutritional status using NFHS and NCAER data in 1992-2006. First, the relative bargaining index defined as the share of mother's schooling years over father's schooling years positively and significantly influences z scores of 'weight-for-age' and 'weight-for-height' -short-term measures of nutritional status of children. The results of quantile regression suggest, however, that the bargaining power will improve a chronic measure of nutritional status, or 'height for age' at the low end of conditional distribution of z score or those stunted. We also find that access to health scheme or health insurance and health-related facility, infrastructure and environment are important factors in reducing child malnutrition. |
| Keywords: | Child Nutrition, Malnutrition, Empowerment, Bargaining, NFHS, NCAER, Quantile Regressions, Pseudo Panel, India |
| JEL: | C21 C23 C26 I14 |
| Date: | 2012–03 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:kob:dpaper:dp2012-11&r=dem |
| By: | Grell, Britta |
| Abstract: | As a consequence of changing patterns of family formation and dissolution in the western world, national welfare institutions confront new demands to accommodate such issues as disproportionate poverty risks among single-mother families, increased requirements for non-parental child care arrangements, and the regulation of child maintenance and support. This paper documents and analyzes the most important social and legal provisions and changes in the United States since the 1980s with implications for the well-being of separated parents and their children, starting with alimony reform legislation to maternity and parental leave programs. It concludes that compared to Germany the institutional and financial support of lowincome custodial parents, the majority of whom are women, is still rather limited. While family-friendly policies - most of them based on employment and the tax system - have been expanded since the 1980s, the US welfare systems provides less financial and legal assistance to vulnerable families with children. -- |
| Date: | 2011 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:zbw:wzbisi:spi2011203&r=dem |
| By: | Manan Roy (Southern Methodist University) |
| Abstract: | The existing evaluations of the Special Supplemental Nutrition Program for Women, Infants, and Children (WIC) agree on a beneficial association with birth weight but not necessarily gestation age. Regardless, considerable doubt exists over whether these associations represent a causal relationship. Endogenous selection into WIC, lack of valid exclusion restrictions, and rampant under-reporting of participation are to blame. Here, I utilize the nonparametric bounds method in Kreider et al. (2011) to address both identification problems simultaneously to assess the causal effect of prenatal WIC participation on birth outcomes. In addition, I complement the partial identification approach by reporting instrumental variable estimates following Lewbel (2010) to circumvent the need for a traditional instrument. Using data from the ECLS-B, I show that ignoring misreporting and only accounting for self-selection, WIC improves birth weight and, sometimes, gestation age. However, if only one percent of eligible women misreport their participation, well below the expected level of misreporting, the effect of WIC on birth outcomes cannot be signed. |
| Keywords: | Special Supplemental Nutrition Program for Women, Infants, and Children, WIC, Chil- dren, Treatment Effects, Health Outcomes, Instrumental Variables, Partial Identification, Nonparametric Bounds, Classification Error. |
| JEL: | C14 C21 I12 I18 |
| Date: | 2012–02 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:smu:ecowpa:1202&r=dem |
| By: | Wörz, Markus |
| Abstract: | Germany has long been faced with low birth rates and a pronounced aging of society. Recently divorces and single parenthood have been on the rise. Family policies and regulations dealing with family break-up are thus confronted with new and greater challenges. After describing important changes in household and family composition in more detail, this paper outlines the regulation of the consequences of family break up in relation to alimony and child support. The main part of the paper focuses on public policies in support of families. Here monetary benefits as well as child care services are considered. Because of the increase of single-parent families a small-subsection specifically looks at special benefits for single parents. The analysis of child care and parental benefits, and their evolution in Germany, reveals considerable increases in benefits since the mid-1980s. The changes in child benefits and parental allowance can be broadly classified into three periods where benefits rise from low to high: 1) until 1985, benefits were very low; 2) in 1986, parental allowance was introduced, so that from 1986 to 1995 the level of benefits was moderate; 3) in 1996, the period of high benefits began and benefits were increased considerably. The 2007 reform of parental allowance led to an implicit indexation in which the benefit is now related to formerly earned income. This reform entailed clear increases for middle and high earners. However, low income earners and recipients of social transfers clearly lost when the benefit duration was reduced. Not only have cash benefits been increased, but child care services have also been extended in the western federal states. In terms of institutional reforms regarding alimony and child support, there has been little change compared to the development of family policy benefits. -- |
| Date: | 2011 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:zbw:wzbisi:spi2011207&r=dem |
| By: | Martin Weale; Silvia Lui; James Mitchell |
| Abstract: | Mortality rates computed from data reported in the British Household PanelSurvey are lower than those computed from registration of deaths; the main source of this error is likely to be a failure to distinguish non-response due to unreported death from other forms of non-response. Here we model the interaction between state of health, mortality and non-response of men aged 65 and over in a trivariate probit model so as to correct for non-response. We then explore whether the restrictions on the model coefficients required to produce the observed aggregate mortality rates can be accepted statistically. We find that the required restrictions are rejected suggesting that the standard treatment of non-response does not fully address the problem. A possible explanation is that the original sample is not fully representative of the population. |
| Date: | 2011–11 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:nsr:niesrd:384&r=dem |
| By: | Grell, Britta |
| Abstract: | When policy discussions turn to income provisions for the old-aged, the focus is often on Social Security programs and the long-term solvency of national public pension systems. While Social Security remains the most important income source for the non-working elderly in the United States, Americans have a much longer tradition of relying on occupational and individual pensions as a crucial part of their retirement income. The paper gives an account of relevant social and legal provisions with implications for voluntary and involuntary retirement, and documents how statutory changes during the past three decades have affected the financial well-being of current and future retirees. It concludes that growing risks in old age are less due to declining Social Security benefits than to several trends in the private industry and financial markets that have seriously weakened employmentbased, old-age protection. In terms of institutional changes, however, the United States has not seen any fundamental restructuring of its public pension system since the 1980s. -- |
| Date: | 2011 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:zbw:wzbisi:spi2011204&r=dem |
| By: | Wörz, Markus |
| Abstract: | Pensions absorb the largest share of the welfare state in financial terms. This is true not only in the aggregate but also for individuals. Financial security in old age is of key importance. The provision of financial security, however, is contingent upon the institutional arrangement of social security systems. This paper describes key features of Statutory Pension Insurance (SPI), the most important provision for financial security in old age from which most senior citizens derive the largest part of their retirement income. It focuses next on core SPI features: How benefits are calculated; important changes since the 1980s; and, how these changes affect average pensions. With various routes into retirement - particularly in Germany - the following chapter then discusses these different paths and how they were reformed over time. Following that, occupational and private pensions are examined as alternative means to oldage financial security other than SPI. Here we do so with empirical data showing the evolution of different, old-age income sources since the 1990s. This institutional description shows that SPI became less generous between 1980 and 2007: First, the pension formula has been modified several times resulting in shrinking benefits. The introduction of actuarial reductions, in 1997, for early enrolment of benefits amplified this, since a considerable number of people retire before the statutory retirement age and, therefore, receive lower pensions. Moreover, in several steps, university education has been completely disregarded in the valuation of pensions. At the same time, credits were given for child-raising and child-care services. Whereas the former is already in force, the latter will only benefit future generations of pensioners. Thus, those most affected by welfare state changes in relation to old-age pensions are pensioners who retire early and have higher education. -- |
| Date: | 2011 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:zbw:wzbisi:spi2011208&r=dem |