Teenage Childbearing and Its Life Cycle Consequences: Exploiting a Natural Experiment

V. Joseph Hotz, Susan Williams McElroy and Seth G. Sanders

Journal of Human Resources, 2005, vol. 40, issue 3

Abstract: We exploit a “natural experiment” associated with human reproduction to identify the causal effect of teen childbearing on the socioeconomic attainment of teen mothers. We exploit the fact that some women who become pregnant experience a miscarriage and do not have a live birth. Using miscarriages an instrumental variable, we estimate the effect of teen mothers not delaying their childbearing on their subsequent attainment. We find that many of the negative consequences of teenage childbearing are much smaller than those found in previous studies. For most outcomes, the adverse consequences of early childbearing are short-lived. Finally, for annual hours of work and earnings, we find that a teen mother would have lower levels of each at older ages if they had delayed their childbearing.

Date: 2005
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (225)

Downloads: (external link)
http://jhr.uwpress.org/cgi/reprint/XL/3/683
A subscription is required to access pdf files. Pay per article is available.

Related works:
Working Paper: Teenage Childbearing and Its Life Cycle Consequences: Exploiting a Natural Experiment (1999)
Working Paper: Teenage Childbearing and Its Life Cycle Consequences: Exploiting a Natural Experiment (1999)
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:uwp:jhriss:v:40:y:2005:i:2:p683-715

Access Statistics for this article

More articles in Journal of Human Resources from University of Wisconsin Press
Bibliographic data for series maintained by ().