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Does womens education affect fertility? Evidence from pre-demographic transition Prussia

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  • Becker, Sascha O.
  • Cinnirella, Francesco
  • Wößmann, Ludger
Abstract
While womens employment opportunities, relative wages, and the childquantityquality trade-off have been studied as factors underlyinghistorical fertility limitation, the role of womens education hasreceived little attention. We combine Prussian county data from threecensusesu1816, 1849, and 1867uto estimate the relationship betweenwomens education and their fertility before the demographic transition.Despite controlling for several demand and supply factors, we find anegative residual effect of womens education on fertility.Instrumental-variable estimates using educational variation derivingfrom landownership concentration, as well as panel estimates controllingfor fixed effects of counties, suggest that the effect of womenseducation on fertility is causal.

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  • Becker, Sascha O. & Cinnirella, Francesco & Wößmann, Ludger, 2013. "Does womens education affect fertility? Evidence from pre-demographic transition Prussia," Munich Reprints in Economics 20263, University of Munich, Department of Economics.
    • Handle: RePEc:lmu:muenar:20263
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    Cited by:

    1. Cinnirella, Francesco & Hornung, Erik, 2016. "Landownership concentration and the expansion of education," Journal of Development Economics, Elsevier, vol. 121(C), pages 135-152.
    2. Viktor Malein, 2021. "Human Capital and Industrialization: German Settlers in Late Imperial Russia," Working Papers 0221, European Historical Economics Society (EHES).
    3. Diebolt, Claude & Mishra, Tapas & Perrin, Faustine, 2015. "Did Gender-Bias Matter in the Quantity-Quality Trade-off in 19th Century France?," Lund Papers in Economic History 141, Lund University, Department of Economic History.
    4. de la Croix, David & Perrin, Faustine, 2018. "How far can economic incentives explain the French fertility and education transition?," European Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 108(C), pages 221-245.
    5. Sascha O. Becker & Francesco Cinnirella & Erik Hornung & Ludger Woessmann, 2014. "iPEHD--The ifo Prussian Economic History Database," Historical Methods: A Journal of Quantitative and Interdisciplinary History, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 47(2), pages 57-66, June.
    6. Fabian Siuda & Uwe Sunde, 2021. "Disease and demographic development: the legacy of the plague," Journal of Economic Growth, Springer, vol. 26(1), pages 1-30, March.
    7. Timothy W. Guinnane & Jochen Streb, 2021. "The Introduction of Bismarck's Social Security System and its Effects on Marriage and Fertility in Prussia," Population and Development Review, The Population Council, Inc., vol. 47(3), pages 749-780, September.
    8. Claude DIEBOLT & Gabriele FRANZMANN & Ralph HIPPE & Jürgen SENSCH, 2017. "The Power of Big Data : Historical Time Series on German Education," JODE - Journal of Demographic Economics, Cambridge University Press, vol. 83(3), pages 329-376, September.
    9. Casper Worm Hansen & Peter Sandholt Jensen & Lars Lønstrup, 2014. "The Fertility Transition in the US: Schooling or Income?," Economics Working Papers 2014-02, Department of Economics and Business Economics, Aarhus University.
    10. Semrad, Alexandra, 2015. "Educational expansion and social composition of secondary schools: evidence from Bavarian school registries 1810-1890," Discussion Papers in Economics 25261, University of Munich, Department of Economics.
    11. Grimm, Michael, 2016. "Rainfall Risk and Fertility: Evidence from Farm Settlements during the American Demographic Transition," IZA Discussion Papers 10351, Institute of Labor Economics (IZA).
    12. Alberto Basso & David Cuberes, 2013. "Fertility and Financial Development: Evidence from U.S. Counties in the 19th Century," Working Papers 2013011, The University of Sheffield, Department of Economics.
    13. Michael Grimm, 2021. "Rainfall risk, fertility and development: evidence from farm settlements during the American demographic transition," Journal of Economic Geography, Oxford University Press, vol. 21(4), pages 593-618.
    14. Ruth Maria Schüler, 2018. "Education Economics from a Historical Perspective," ifo Beiträge zur Wirtschaftsforschung, ifo Institute - Leibniz Institute for Economic Research at the University of Munich, number 78.
    15. Manoel Bittencourt, 2014. "Primary Education and Fertility Rates in Southern Africa: Evidence from Before the Demographic Transition," Working Papers 432, Economic Research Southern Africa.
    16. Brian Beach & W. Walker Hanlon, 2019. "Censorship, Family Planning, and the Historical Fertility Transition," NBER Working Papers 25752, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    17. Klaus Deininger & Songqing Jin & Hari K. Nagarajan & Fang Xia, 2019. "Inheritance Law Reform, Empowerment, and Human Capital Accumulation: Second-Generation Effects from India," Journal of Development Studies, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 55(12), pages 2549-2571, December.
    18. Manoel Bittencourt, 2014. "Education and Fertility: Panel Time-Series Evidence from Southern Africa," Working Papers 431, Economic Research Southern Africa.
    19. Seung‐hun Chung & Mark D. Partridge, 2021. "De facto power of elites and regional growth," Papers in Regional Science, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 100(1), pages 169-202, February.
    20. Charlotte Le Chapelain, 2013. "Cliométrie et Capital humain," Working Papers 01-13, Association Française de Cliométrie (AFC).
    21. Manoel Bittencourt, 2018. "Primary education and fertility rates : Evidence from Southern Africa," The Economics of Transition, The European Bank for Reconstruction and Development, vol. 26(2), pages 283-302, April.
    22. Beblo, Miriam & Görges, Luise, 2018. "On the nature of nurture. The malleability of gender differences in work preferences," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 151(C), pages 19-41.
    23. Muhammad Zakaria & Bashir Ahmed Fida & Saquib Yousaf Janjua & Syed Jawad Hussain Shahzad, 2017. "Fertility and Financial Development in South Asia," Social Indicators Research: An International and Interdisciplinary Journal for Quality-of-Life Measurement, Springer, vol. 133(2), pages 645-668, September.

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