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on Demographic Economics |
| By: | Regina Calles; Tom Vogl |
| Abstract: | Latin America's momentous fertility transition is now in the domain of history, allowing a cohort perspective on the decline of completed fertility. Using census microdata from 17 Latin American countries, we track female birth cohorts from the 1920s to the 1970s by subnational region to document the extent to which cohort fertility decline coincided with other demographic and socioeconomic processes. Across cohorts within subnational regions, children ever born fell one-for-one with mortality decline. Expansions in urbanization, multigenerational living, women's and husbands' education, women's employment, and the non-agricultural sector all predicted declines in ever-born and surviving fertility, but women's education and sectoral composition were the dominant forces after covariate adjustment. Fertility decline was not systematically linked with improvements in children's outcomes, including school enrollment, literacy, primary completion, and non-employment. These cohort facts challenge theories of fertility decline centered on women's work and children's education but support others emphasizing women's education. |
| JEL: | J13 N36 O15 |
| Date: | 2026–06 |
| URL: | https://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:nbr:nberwo:35326 |
| By: | Sinara Gharibyan (IOS - Ost- und Südosteuropa verstehen); David Gomtsyan (CREI - Centre de Recerca en Economia Internacional - UPF - Universitat Pompeu Fabra [Barcelona]); Èric Roca Fernández (CERDI - Centre d'Études et de Recherches sur le Développement International - IRD - Institut de Recherche pour le Développement - CNRS - Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique - UCA - Université Clermont Auvergne) |
| Abstract: | This paper explores the relationship between geographic mortality differentials and human capital investment patterns in the Malthusian setup of 19th-century Armenia. We examine how variations in altitude are associated with mortality rates, human capital accumulation, and fertility decisions. Using detailed historical census and parish records, we document that higher-altitude areas tend to have lower population density, lower respiratory disease mortality, and lower overall mortality. Our empirical analysis also shows that individuals in these environments tend to display better numeracy skills and lower fertility rates. These findings align with the Ben-Porath hypothesis, suggesting that longer life horizons encourage shifting from child quantity to quality. Furthermore, these patterns are not driven by income differences or increased female autonomy arising from pastoral agriculture |
| Keywords: | Human capital formation, Mortality, Disease environment, Geography, Armenia |
| Date: | 2026–05–29 |
| URL: | https://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:hal:journl:hal-05654079 |
| By: | Liran Einav; Amy Finkelstein |
| Abstract: | Rising elderly life expectancy is a well-known source of fiscal pressure on Social Security and Medicare – but how have declining mortality and morbidity affected the two programs’ relative finances? Using nearly three decades of Medicare Current Beneficiary Survey data (1992-2019), we estimate that these demographic changes raised expected lifetime Social Security spending by over twice as much as expected lifetime Medicare spending: 14% compared to 6%. The slower growth of elderly lifetime health care spending than annuity spending reflects two features of how longevity has increased: the additional 2.4 years of remaining life expectancy were entirely healthy – free of physical or cognitive limitations – while the expected amount of time spent with severe health limitations fell by about 30%, reducing expected lifetime nursing-home and home-health use. We then write down a stylized life-cycle model of a risk-averse retiree facing stochastic mortality and health to illuminate the key forces that affect the optimal allocation of a fixed amount of public funds across Medicare and Social Security. |
| JEL: | H51 H55 I1 J14 |
| Date: | 2026–06 |
| URL: | https://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:nbr:nberwo:35346 |
| By: | W. Addessi; D. Angelini; M. Delogu |
| Abstract: | In a pay-as-you-go (PAYG) pension system, the fiscal effects of fertility depend on the instrument through which the pension balance is restored. When the pension budget is balanced by adjusting contribution rates or pension benefits, fertility generates a positive fiscal externality because additional children expand the future contributor base, implying that decentralized fertility is inefficiently low. However, pension systems are often adjusted through the retirement age. We show that, when retirement age is the equilibrating margin, higher fertility not only improves pension financing but also reduces retirement age, creating an additional retirement-leisure channel. In a simple overlapping-generation model with PAYG pension system, decentralized fertility can therefore be either too high or too low relative to the PAYG-constrained social planner allocation. The sign of the distortion depends on whether the retirement age required for PAYG balance is above or below the retirement age households would prefer, given the contribution rate and pension benefit. |
| Keywords: | Fertility, Retirement, Pay-as-you-go pensions, Pension reform, Demographic change |
| JEL: | H55 J13 J26 |
| Date: | 2026 |
| URL: | https://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:cns:cnscwp:202607 |
| By: | David Escamilla-Guerrero; Giovanni Peri |
| Abstract: | This paper leverages variation in the access to the Mexican railroad network in the early 1900s to estimate its impact on migration to the United States and evaluate its long-run persistence after passenger rail service became obsolete. Using an IV strategy based on least-cost paths between historical cities, we find that locations with railroad access had migration rates four times higher than those without in the early twentieth century. Sequential migration was the key mechanism: railroads first facilitated internal mobility toward railroad hubs, then onward migration to the US. Railroad access also contributed to structural transformation, raising urbanization and local economic development. In terms of persistence, locations with historical railroad access show weakly lower total migration rates to the US in the early 21st century, consistent with local economic growth reducing the incentive to migrate. Yet destination-specific patterns prove remarkably durable: locations that disproportionately sent migrants to California, Arizona, or Texas in the 1900s continued to do so in the 2000s, reflecting the persistence of migrant networks. |
| JEL: | J60 N36 N76 R41 |
| Date: | 2026–06 |
| URL: | https://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:nbr:nberwo:35358 |
| By: | Althoff, Lukas (Princeton University); Szerman, Christiane (London School of Economics) |
| Abstract: | The World War II GI Bill was the largest education subsidy in US history. Although formally race-blind, the program's decentralized administration left implementation to local officials and segregated institutions, with sharply different consequences for Black and white veterans. We quantify the GI Bill's impact on Black and white Americans' economic outcomes across two generations, using a regression discontinuity around WWII service eligibility cutoffs and a new data linkage from veterans in the 1940 and 1950 censuses to their sons' neighborhood outcomes between 1990 and 2025. The GI Bill widened racial inequality, doubling white veterans' college completion while steering Black veterans into vocational programs with no earnings returns. The disparities persisted across generations, increasing the white-Black gap in sons' adult-neighborhood outcomes, including a 5-percentage-point (47 percent) widening of the racial college gap. Unequal returns to the same eligibility account for the intergenerational gap, with no contribution from prewar differences in socioeconomic status or geography, illustrating that race-blind subsidies channeled through discriminatory institutions can widen rather than close racial gaps. |
| Keywords: | racial inequality, intergenerational mobility, race-blind policy, discrimination, education |
| JEL: | I24 I38 J15 J62 J71 |
| Date: | 2026–06 |
| URL: | https://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:iza:izadps:dp18720 |
| By: | Jocelyn Wikle; Riley Wilson |
| Abstract: | Over the last 70 years, there has been a dramatic increase in female labor supply. However, gender gaps in employment trajectories remain, in part because the role of childrearing has largely fallen upon women. Providing more publicly funded childcare could relax these constraints, which may have ramifications for mothers' labor supply decisions over time. We examine the dynamic effects of gaining childcare access earlier on mothers' labor supply. Using a regression discontinuity in kindergarten eligibility cutoffs for nearly 7.5 million U.S. mothers, we estimate how gaining access to childcare, through public school, one year earlier affects maternal employment over time. Enrolling a child in school one year earlier increases annual maternal employment by 2.2 percentage points, and the effect persists for two years, even though children born after the eligibility cutoff gain similar access the next year. However, employment effects eventually fade out, highlighting the limited role publicly-provided childcare plays in closing long-term gender gaps. We show that mothers take on additional family management responsibilities after childbirth, and these responsibilities are not relaxed by gaining childcare access. Moving childcare access earlier will not necessarily close gender gaps in employment as mothers still face these additional constraints. |
| Keywords: | maternal labor supply, public school, kindergarten |
| JEL: | H75 I28 J13 J16 J22 |
| Date: | 2026 |
| URL: | https://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:ces:ceswps:_12727 |