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on Demographic Economics |
| By: | Julia Hellstrand (Max Planck Institute for Demographic Research, Rostock, Germany); Jessica Nisén (Max Planck Institute for Demographic Research, Rostock, Germany); Mikko Myrskylä (Max Planck Institute for Demographic Research, Rostock, Germany) |
| Abstract: | Fertility declined sharply and unexpectedly in Finland in the 2010s. Using detailed Finnish register data, we calculated total fertility rates (TFRs) and the proportion of women expected to have a first birth (TFRp1) in 2010–2019 for 153 fields of education and estimated how the characteristics of each field predicted its fertility decline. As educational field predicts factors related to economic uncertainty, heterogeneity in fertility decline across fields could shed light on the role of economic uncertainty behind the recent fertility decline. In general, women with the highest initial fertility levels (health, welfare, and education) and women in agriculture experienced weaker fertility declines (around -20% or less), while women with the lowest initial fertility levels (ICT, arts and humanities) experienced stronger fertility declines (around -40% or more). The extent of the fertility decline increased with higher unemployment and lower income levels of the field, and with a lower share employed in the public sector. These uncertainty measures together explained one-fourth of the decline in TFR and two-fifths of the decline in first births. The results imply that groups characterized by stable job prospects escaped very strong fertility declines and that objective economic uncertainty fueled the fertility decline in Finland. |
| Keywords: | Finland, fertility decline |
| JEL: | J1 Z0 |
| Date: | 2022 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:dem:wpaper:wp-2022-022&r= |
| By: | Baland,Jean-Marie; Cassan,Guilhem; Decerf,Benoit Marie A |
| Abstract: | Poverty and mortality are arguably the two major sources of loss of well-being. Most mainstreammeasures of human development capturing these two dimensions aggregate them in an ad-hoc and controversial way. Thispaper develops a new index aggregating the poverty and the mortality observed in a given period in a consistent way. Itis called the poverty-adjusted life expectancy index. This index is based on a single normative parameter thattransparently captures the trade-off between well-being losses from being poor or from being dead. The paper firstshows that the poverty-adjusted life expectancy index follows naturally from an expected life-cycle utilityapproach a la Harsanyi. The paper then proceeds to empirical comparisons between countries and across time and focuses onsituations in which poverty and mortality provide conflicting evaluations. Once it is assumed that being pooris (at least weakly) preferable to being dead, the analysis finds that about a third of these conflicting comparisonscan be unambiguously ranked by the poverty-adjusted life expectancy index. Finally, the paper shows that this indexnaturally defines a new and simple index of multidimensional poverty, the expected deprivation index. |
| Date: | 2022–07–29 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:wbk:wbrwps:10133&r= |
| By: | Eliason, Marcus (IFAU - Institute for Evaluation of Labour Market and Education Policy) |
| Abstract: | Schizophrenia spectrum, bipolar, and major depressive disorders are severe mental illnesses (SMIs) that not only entail great suffering for those affected but also major societal costs. In this study, I use administrative register data to provide a detailed picture of the economic situation of people with SMI in Sweden during a period of 10 years around first-time in-patient diagnosis. First-time in-patient diagnosis was associated with a considerable drop in earnings, which was largely compensated for by social transfers: mainly sickness and disability insurance. However, there were also large and increasing pre-diagnosis earnings gaps, relative to matched comparison groups, especially among those with schizophrenia spectrum disorders. This gap was to lesser extent compensated for by social transfers. Consequently, there was a permanent and increasing – due to lost earnings growth – income differential. Hence, findings in previous studies are confirmed: even in an advanced welfare state, people with SMI – especially those with schizophrenia – have an extremely weak position on the labour market and an equally difficult financial situation. |
| Keywords: | Schizophrenia spectrum disorder; bipolar disorder; major depressive disorder; social insurances; labour market situation |
| JEL: | I13 I14 J14 J65 |
| Date: | 2022–10–19 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:hhs:ifauwp:2022_019&r= |