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The purpose of this paper is to estimate the impacts of women's education on the mean age of women at first birth (denoting the timing of fertility) and total fertility rate (TFR, denoting the level of fertility) using cross-country panel data.

The estimations proceed in two steps: first, the timing and level of fertility regressions are separately estimated, and second, two regressions are estimated at the same time as a form of a system equation to accommodate the correlations between error terms.

It is found that a higher women's education tends to delay of child birth or family formation. In addition, there exists a negative relationship between the female secondary school enrollment ratio and TFR, meaning that the opportunity costs of childbearing and rearing increases when the level of women's education enhances. However, the authors have also found that the impacts of women's higher education on TFR is statistically insignificant in a few cases of estimations without sample selections.

Fertility decline is a shift of childbearing to older ages. The delay of child birth or family formation is the major cause of the recent fertility decline, because a late women's age at first birth reduces the chances of having any further children. This implies that the timing and level of fertility are highly correlated to each other. In particular, many studies showed that women's education and employment have been identified as major parameters for the increase in women's age at first birth. Nonetheless, little attention has been paid to an empirical analysis of the relationship between women's education and the timing of fertility. Therefore, this paper is an extension of previous studies, estimating the relationship between women's education and the timing and level of fertility at the same time.

The similarity of family planning (FP) indicators from EDHS2014 to that of EDHS2000 is alarming for policymakers and researchers who consider it as an echo of the past and a threat, which the FP programme has to face to prevent its progression. In 2000, the total fertility rate (TFR) was 3.5, the contraceptive prevalence rate was 56.1% and the discontinuation rate was 29.5%. In 2014, these indicators were 3.5, 58.5 and 30.1%, respectively. Although the change in the all method discontinuation rate is not large, it is a result of great changes in the method specific discontinuation rates, which was masked by changes in the contraceptive method mix. This study aims to present a comparison between contraceptive discontinuation rates in 2000, 2008 and 2014, discuss the reasons for discontinuation by methods and background characteristics of women and calculate the impact of eliminating discontinuation for reasons related to method and service provision on fertility.

Single/multiple decrement life tables were applied to the calendar data of the EDHS2008 and EDHS2014, to examine various net rates of contraceptive discontinuation by reasons and the status after discontinuation. The TFR estimated in the absence of method failure and abandonment while in need of births occurred within 24 months after discontinuation using installed Stata command tfr2.

The study estimates the impact of discontinuation on the TFR in 2014 to be an increase of about 20%. The TFR of 3.5 would have been only 2.8 if discontinuation due to method failure and method/service-related reasons were eliminated. Improvement regarding discontinuation behaviour is evident by increased switching, from 43.6 to 54.3% and the drop in the proportion of abandoning use while in need from 56.4 to 45.7%. Differentials suggest that discontinuation is expected to increase among vulnerable groups as desired fertility continues to rise. The increase in the share of “desire to become pregnant” – as a reason for discontinuation is a recent trend observed during the period between EDHS2008 and EDHS2014 and is recognised as a challenge by the national population strategy.

This study confirms that contraceptive discontinuation is an important part of the overall fertility increase observed by EDHS2014. The rising trend of increased desired family size and the shift away from using the intra uterine device may be considered as major challenges facing the FP programme in Egypt.

The last reformation in Iran’s population policy was announced inside “General Population Policy” (GPP) in 2013. One of the main objectives of the GPP is controlling population aging. The aim was to designing and evaluating different scenarios for achieving this objective.

For this purpose, a system dynamics model was built from cohort age groups. The model simulated Iran’s population structure from 2000 to 2050. The system dynamics model was validated in 2000 till 2011 period (R² = 94%). Data were extracted from the United Nations population division repository and represent a reducing trend in the fertility rate of Iran. This situation was named the “base” scenario. The simulation results for this scenario showed that Iran will face aging such that between 2000 and 2050 the median age will increase from 25 to 43 years. Based on these results, the base scenario could not achieve the GPP objective. So three alternative scenarios were designated: stabilization, increasing and hyper increasing.

The median age and the aging index are descending only in the hyper increasing scenario which means controlling aging. Therefore, the hyper increasing scenario is the only way to realize the GPP’s objective. To realize the hyper increasing scenario, it is essential to consider the total dependency ratio which shows the level of pressure on the workforce. Reducing this pressure increases the propensity to have more children (fertility index) and this is essential for maintaining high fertility rate.

The value of the research rests on a precise simulation model to forecast the population structure and aging. The research will serve as a guide for Iranian policymaker and support strong recommendations to bring the GPP along with supporting policies such as childbearing and child care assistance.

The purpose of this paper is to examine the relationship among fertility, female education and female labour participation in ASEAN-7 countries: Malaysia, Indonesia, Brunei, Myanmar, the Philippines, Vietnam and Thailand, between 1990 and 2015. The choice of these countries is informed by their economic, social and political importance in the ASEAN Bloc; while Indonesia boasts of the largest population in ASEAN, Brunei and Malaysia boast of relatively advanced economies, in GDP terms.

Pesaran’s test of panel unit root in the presence of cross-sectional dependence was employed to test for the stationarity properties of the series. The dynamic long-run coefficients of the variables were examined using the pooled mean group, common correlated effect and dynamic OLS techniques, while the Granger causality test was used to estimate the direction of causality among the variables.

The findings indicate that there is both negative and positive relationship between fertility and labour force participation, with causality running from labour force participation through fertility – on the one hand, and between education and labour force participation, with no causality between the two – on the other hand.

The study, therefore, upholds the role incompatibility and societal response hypothesis, as well as human capital and opportunity cost theories.

The appropriate policies are those that gear the countries’ fertility decisions towards the societal response hypothesis in order to enhance human capital development and increase productivity. This implies that the governments of ASEAN-7 countries should ease hindrances on a balanced combination of family-care and workforce participation on married women in view of the gender-wage gap created by female work apathy, which largely reduces domestic productivities. Appropriate policies in this direction include rising availability and affordability of childcare facilities, incentives for women higher education, attitudinal changes towards job-participating mothers, as well as legislated paid parental leaves which have balanced the, hitherto, incompatibility between work and childbearing.

Except for Abdullah et al. (2013), the authors have no knowledge of other authors who have worked on this relationship in the chosen ASEAN countries. This study is, however, an improvement upon that of Abdullah et al. (2013) in different ways, one of which is that it considers seven ASEAN countries, thus making the results more valid representation of the ASEAN Bloc. Furthermore, the Pesaran (2007) technique of unit root testing has not been found in any recent literature on the subject-matter. This technique, being a second-generation test, tests variable unit root in the presence of cross-sectional dependence.

The purpose of this paper is to analyze the link between two different family policy dimensions – one supporting the combination of work and parenthood and one supporting stay-at-home mothers – and fertility rates between 1995 and 2011 in 33 industrialized countries.

Total fertility rates were regressed on the two policy dimensions, earner–carer support and traditional–family support, using pooled time-series analysis with country fixed effects and stepwise control for female labor force participation, unemployment rates and GDP.

The analyses show that earner–carer support is linked to higher fertility, while traditional–family support is not. Also, higher female labor force participation is linked to higher fertility before GDP is included. Conversely, higher unemployment is correlated with lower fertility levels. Sensitivity analyses with and without day care enrollment on a smaller set of countries show no influence of day care on the results for family policy.

The results give weight to the argument that family policies supporting the combination of work and parenthood could increase fertility in low-fertility countries, probably mediated in part by female labor force participation. Earnings-related earner–carer support incentivizes women to enter the labor force before parenthood and to return to work after time off with their newborn child, thus supporting a combination of work and parenthood.

The purpose of this paper is to explore the relationship between the ratification of the United Nations’ (UN’s) Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination against Women (CEDAW) and women’s and girls’ health outcomes using a unique longitudinal data set of 192 UN-member countries that encompasses the years from 1980 to 2011.

The authors focus on the impact of CEDAW ratification, number of reports submitted after ratification, years passed since ratification, and the dynamic impact of CEDAW ratification by utilizing ordinary least squares (OLS) and panel fixed effects methods. The study investigates the following women’s and girls’ health outcomes: total fertility rate, adolescent fertility rate, infant mortality rate, maternal mortality ratio, neonatal mortality rate, female life expectancy at birth (FLEB), and female to male life expectancy at birth.

The OLS and panel country and year fixed effects models provide evidence that the impact of CEDAW ratification on women’s and girls’ health outcomes varies by global regions. While the authors find no significant gains in health outcomes in European and North-American countries, the countries in the Northern Africa, sub-Saharan Africa, Southern Africa, Caribbean and Central America, South America, Middle-East, Eastern Asia, and Oceania regions experienced the biggest gains from CEDAW ratification, exhibiting reductions in total fertility, adolescent fertility, infant mortality, maternal mortality, and neonatal mortality while also showing improvements in FLEB. The results provide evidence that both early commitment to CEDAW as measured by the total number of years of engagement after the UN’s 1980 ratification and the timely submission of mandatory CEDAW reports have positive impacts on women’ and girls’ health outcomes. Several sensitivity tests confirm the robustness of main findings.

This study is the first comprehensive attempt to explore the multifaceted relationships between CEDAW ratification and female health outcomes. The study significantly expands on the methods of earlier research and presents novel methods and findings on the relationship between CEDAW ratification and women’s health outcomes. The findings suggest that the impact of CEDAW ratification significantly depends on the country’s region. Furthermore, stronger engagement with CEDAW (as indicated by the total number of years following country ratification) and the submission of the required CEDAW reports (as outlined in the Convention’s guidelines) have positive impacts on women’s and girls’ health outcomes.

This study aims to apply two recently discovered relationships that describe fertility recovery in developed countries to East Asia: the U-shaped relationship between fertility and FLP (female labor participation) and the inverse-J-shaped relationship between fertility and income.

It uses a panel data set of 176 countries including 13 East Asian countries from 1990 to 2014. Pooled ordinary least squares, fixed-effects and random-effects models are tested.

The main findings are the following points concerning East Asia: The U-shape and the inverse-J-shape are confirmed, suggesting that fertility recovery could be realized if both FLP and income are high enough and increasing; in the region, the U-shape is peculiar. Lower-income countries’ data move from the upper-right to the bottom, whereas higher-income countries’ data move from the upper-left to the bottom; no country in the region has reached the stage where both FLP and income are high enough.

This is the first paper on East Asia to show the U-shape and the inverse-J-shape concerning fertility recovery and the peculiarity of the U-shape in East Asia. It explains the background of low fertility using the relationship between fertility, FLP and income.

This paper aims to unpack the nexus of development and demography controlling for three important variables to represent the meaning of development, that is, poverty rate, unemployment rate and human development index (HDI). Demographic variables are proxied with total fertility rate (TFR) and net migration rate (NMR).

This research applies cluster analysis at the provincial level using INDO-DAPOER and 2015 Intercensal Population Survey data sets.

Demographic and development status of Indonesian provinces can be classified into four clusters, and members of these clusters are mostly dissimilar with those of previous groupings on demographic dividends (Adioetomo, 2018). With only less than 50% matching rate, the author argues that there is no simple linear relationship between demographic and development variables.

The most recent data set on Population Census Year 2020 has not been made available at the time of the writing. Also sometimes known as unsupervised classification, cluster analysis is about finding groups in a set of objects characterised only by certain measurements; therefore, findings of this study need to be positioned solely within the context of development and demography.

Taxonomy in this study offers a more nuanced and contextual understanding of the diverse challenges at the local and regional levels. Recommendations from this study lead to asymmetrical design in development policies and budget proportions at local levels.

It is expected that the findings are relevant to the input of policymaking process within the sphere of development and demography, especially for countries with significant size of populations and grappling with development issues.

To the author’s understanding, this paper is the first to discuss the impact of “demographic dividend” to economic development in Indonesia using the approach of cluster analysis. The expected contribution of this work is twofold: Firstly, the author would like to ignite a discourse on the nexus of development and demography using the most recent data set and cutting-edge method. Secondly, the findings are relevant to the input of policymaking process within the sphere of development and demography, especially for countries with significant size of populations and grappling with development issues.

In this paper, we use data from the US census to document the history of the relationship between fertility choice and key economic indicators at the individual level for women born between 1826 and 1960. We find that this data suggests several new facts that should be useful for researchers trying to model fertility. (1) The reduction in fertility known as the Demographic Transition (or the Fertility Transition) seems to be much sharper based on cohort fertility measures compared to usual measures like Total Fertility Rate; (2) The baby boom was not quite as large as is suggested by some previous work; (3) We find a strong negative relationship between income and fertility for all cohorts and estimate an overall income elasticity of about −0.38 for the period; (4) We also find systematic deviations from a time invariant, iso-elastic, relationship between income and fertility. The most interesting of these is an increase in the income elasticity of demand for children for the 1876–1880 to 1906–1910 birth cohorts. This implies an increased spread in fertility by income which was followed by a dramatic compression.