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on Demographic Economics |
| By: | Daniela Del Boca (University of Turin and Collegio Carlo Alberto); Luca Favero (University of St. Andrews); Chiara Pronzato (University of Turin) |
| Abstract: | Many advanced economies face persistently low fertility alongside rapid population ageing, raising concerns about economic sustainability and demographic balance. Addressing these challenges requires both sustained labor market participation among the working-age population and conditions that support childbearing. These objectives place women, and particularly mothers, at the center of the demographic debate, as motherhood remains a key turning point in employment trajectories and family formation. Using experimental evidence from an intervention targeting mothers who curtailed employment due to childcare responsibilities, the paper finds that improving work–family reconciliation can support mothers’ labor market reintegration, promote investments in existing children, and, under conditions of greater stability, strengthen fertility desires. |
| Keywords: | work, motherhood, family-friendly policies, desired fertility |
| JEL: | J13 J18 J21 |
| Date: | 2026–05 |
| URL: | https://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:hka:wpaper:2026-006 |
| By: | Kanato Nakakuni |
| Abstract: | Empirical studies suggest that income uncertainty depresses fertility, yet its policy im plications remain underexplored. This paper shows that income-tested education subsidies provide insurance against income risk for households with children, mitigating the negative effects of income uncertainty on fertility. I build and calibrate an incomplete-market general equilibrium lifecycle model with fertility and college enrollment choices, in which altruistic parents make asset transfers to support their children’s college education. Having more children increases the risk that parents may be unable to finance their children’s education after bad income shocks or, if they do finance it, must endure substantially lower lifetime consumption. This mechanism discourages fertility under income uncertainty and generates the observed negative relationship between income risk and fertility. Counterfactual exper iments show that income-tested college subsidies insure households against these risks by reducing education costs contingent on bad income shocks. The resulting fertility responses amplify the aggregate effects of the subsidy, including increases in educational attainment and intergenerational mobility. |
| Keywords: | Fertility, incomplete markets, college subsidy, income risk |
| JEL: | C68 I28 J13 J24 |
| Date: | 2026–09 |
| URL: | https://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:bon:boncrc:crctr224_2025_780 |
| By: | Jiseon Baek (Max Planck Institute for Demographic Research, Rostock, Germany); D. Susie Lee (Max Planck Institute for Demographic Research, Rostock, Germany) |
| Abstract: | Fertility of immigrant women has often been framed as a remedy for declining birth rates and population ageing in some high-income countries with low fertility rates. South Korea, for example, has attracted immigrant women to form families with South Korean men – often through a commodified process involving broker agencies – resulting in older native men matching with younger Southeast Asian women. Yet, immigrant women in South Korea have shown fertility rates that are either similar to or lower than those of native Korean women. To explain this unexpectedly low trend, this study 1) describes sociodemographic characteristics of immigrant women in commodified marriages, 2) quantifies their first and second birth risks, and 3) tests if a large spousal age gap explains the lower fertility outcomes. Event-history analyses were conducted based on the samples derived from National Survey of Multicultural Families and the National Survey on Fertility, Family Health, and Welfare. Findings indicate that commodified marriage migrant women display an accelerated transition to a first birth, but show depressed rates for second births, compared to other migrant women. Furthermore, the relative older age of husband appears as a condition that deters fertility progression. These findings suggest that structural barriers, including large spousal age gaps and multidimensional disadvantages, may constrain these women’s family-building prospects. |
| Keywords: | Korea, South, fertility, immigrants |
| JEL: | J1 Z0 |
| Date: | 2026 |
| URL: | https://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:dem:wpaper:wp-2026-039 |
| By: | Pietro Biroli (University of Zurich); Nicolau Martin-Bassols (University of Bologna); Andries Marees (Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam); Hans van Kippersluis (Erasmus University); Cornelius Rietveld (Erasmus University); Pia Arce (University of Zurich); Kevin Thom (University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee); Stephanie von Hinke (University of Bristol, Erasmus University, and Institute for Fiscal Studies); Jeremy Vollen (University of Zurich); Titus Galama (University of Southern California) |
| Abstract: | The start of a human’s life can be characterized by two lotteries: that of your genes (nature) and the family you were born into (nurture). These set in motion a trajectory, from birth onward, in health and human capital. Leveraging three longitudinal socialscience data sets, we systematically analyze the relationship between an individual’s genotype, the socioeconomic status (SES) of the families they grew up in, and their realized traits in adulthood. We proxy an individual’s genetic predisposition by polygenic indexes (PGIs) and family SES by a latent factor of parental education and father’s (former) occupational status. We then investigate how PGIs, parental SES, and their interaction contribute to later-life outcomes across a range of forty-five socioeconomic, anthropometric, health, behavioral, and personality traits. We find strong genetic and socioeconomic associations with these phenotypes, but no evidence of sizable gene-environment interactions. |
| Keywords: | gene-by-environment interplay, genoeconomics, polygenic indices, social sciences genetics, ESSGN |
| JEL: | I14 I00 J24 |
| Date: | 2026–05 |
| URL: | https://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:hka:wpaper:2026-007 |
| By: | Evelina Björkegren (Stockholm University); Aline Butikofer (Norwegian School of Economics); Gabriella Conti (University College London); Marten Palme (University College London); Kjell Salvanes (Norges Handelshøyskole) |
| Abstract: | This study examines the long-term consequences of neonatal health using three birth anthropometric measures — weight, length, and head circumference — and analyzes their differential associations with outcomes across the life course. Using linked Swedish and Norwegian population registers with follow-up into adulthood, we compare birth measures of singletons and twins and further estimate within-twin-pair fixed-effects models that control for shared genetic and family environmental factors. Our samples comprise up to approximately 679, 000 singletons and 10, 400 twins in Sweden, and 347, 841 singletons and 6, 762 twins in Norway, followed into adulthood. We find that different birth measures capture distinct aspects of fetal development with varying predictive validity across outcome domains. Birth length emerges as the strongest predictor of health outcomes (infant mortality, adult height), consistent with its role as a cumulative indicator of skeletal growth throughout gestation. Birth weight retains stronger associations with cognitive and educational outcomes (grade point average [GPA], years of schooling) in conditional models. Head circumference shows weak and inconsistent associations across specifications. Using within-pair head circumference differences to classify twins as symmetrically versus asymmetrically growth restricted, we find that symmetric intrauterine growth restriction is associated with substantially worse long-term outcomes than asymmetric restriction. In Norwegian twin pairs, growth restriction is associated with lower general cognitive ability (measured at military enlistment) relative to the unaffected co-twin; this within-pair deficit is more than twice as large for symmetric as for asymmetric restriction. We also document significant intergenerational transmission of birth anthropometrics, suggesting both environmental and genetic contributions. Finally, our register-based design with near-complete population coverage minimizes selection bias and attrition while providing statistical power for within-pair analyses across multiple outcomes. Exclusive reliance on birth weight may obscure important information about early-gestation developmental insults. |
| Keywords: | birth weight, birth length, head circumference, twin study, fetal origins, intrauterine growth restriction, administrative data |
| JEL: | I14 I12 J13 J24 |
| Date: | 2026–09 |
| URL: | https://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:hka:wpaper:2026-012 |
| By: | Peter A. Diamond |
| Abstract: | Public pension systems are long-term social contracts operating under persistent economic, demographic, and political uncertainty. Periods of turbulence, marked by financial shocks, changes in longevity, and shifting labour markets, test the capacity of pension institutions to adapt while maintaining adequacy, equity, and legitimacy. Building on earlier joint work on pension economics and reform with Nicholas Barr, this chapter analyses the role of automatic and semi-automatic adjustment mechanisms in public pension design. Drawing on comparative experience from Sweden, Canada, and the United States, we examine mechanisms for maintaining financial balance, the incorporation of life expectancy into retirement age and benefit design, and the accumulation and drawdown phases of defined contribution pensions. We argue that well-designed automatic mechanisms can discipline political decision-making and improve resilience, but only if they are proportionate, transparent, and attentive to distributional and intergenerational consequences. In turbulent times, good pension design does not eliminate the need for political choice; rather, it structures that choice so that adjustment can occur without repeated crises. |
| JEL: | H55 |
| Date: | 2026–09 |
| URL: | https://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:nbr:nberwo:35693 |