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Gender‐Role Ideology, Labor Market Institutions, and Post‐industrial Fertility
Author(s) -
Brinton Mary C.,
Lee DongJu
Publication year - 2016
Publication title -
population and development review
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 1.836
H-Index - 96
eISSN - 1728-4457
pISSN - 0098-7921
DOI - 10.1111/padr.161
Subject(s) - disclaimer , ideology , fertility , labour economics , content (measure theory) , economics , political science , sociology , law , population , politics , demography , mathematical analysis , mathematics
SEVERAL REGIONS of the post-industrial world face what some observers have called a crisis of the family: increasing rates of non-marriage and very low birth rates. Fertility rates in Southern and Eastern Europe as well as East Asia are well below population replacement level (Anderson and Kohler 2015; Billari and Kohler 2004; Goldstein, Sobotka, and Jasilioniene 2009; Kohler, Billari, and Ortega 2002; Ogawa 2003). Ironically, many of the countries with very low birth rates have conventionally been regarded as the most family-oriented within the post-industrial world (Dalla Zuanna and Micheli 2004; De Rose, Racioppi, and Zonatta 2008; Frejka, Jones, and Sardon 2010; Livi-Bacci 2001; Mills et al. 2008; Ochiai 2011). These include countries such as Italy, Japan, South Korea, and Spain, which have traditionally been characterized by near-universal marriage and childbearing. The historically unprecedented decline to total fertility rates of 1.3 or fewer children per woman took social scientists and national governments by surprise in the waning decades of the twentieth century, especially since it contrasts with total fertility rates close to 2.0 in Canada, France, Norway, Sweden, the United States, and a number of other countries. Beyond constituting a fascinating contrast for demographers to explain, cross-country variation in fertility rates in the post-industrial world poses important policy issues. Societies with very low fertility face challenges related to rapid population aging, declining economic productivity, debates over the role of immigration as a solution, and increased intergenerational conflict over the distribution of government resources. Social scientists’ explanations of comparative fertility across postindustrial societies have increasingly turned to cross-cultural variation in the extent of gender inequality (Anderson and Kohler 2015; Arpino, Esping-Andersen and Pessin 2015; Bernhardt and Goldscheider 2006; Esping-Andersen, and Billari 2015; Chesnais 1998; Esping-Andersen 2009; Goldscheider, Bernhardt, and Lappegård 2015; McDonald 2000a, b; 2013; Mills 2010; Mills et al. 2008). McDonald has argued that the