Roadblocks on the Road to Grandma's House: Fertility Consequences of Delayed Retirement

Mario Padula, Erich Battistin and Michele De Nadai

No 9945, CEPR Discussion Papers from Centre for Economic Policy Research

Abstract: We investigate the role of grandparental childcare for fertility decisions of their offspring. Exploiting pension reforms in Italy, we argue that delayed retirement means a negative shock to the supply of informal childcare for the next generation. We show that one additional grandparent available in the early child-bearing years increases by 5% the number of children. Effects are limited to the most familistic close-knits, and are not the mechanical consequence of changes in living arrangements, investment in education or labor supply. Given the Italian lowest low fertility, we conclude that pension reforms may have had unintended inter-generational effects.

Keywords: Fertility; Informal child care; Pension reforms (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: H42 J08 J13 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2014-04
New Economics Papers: this item is included in nep-age, nep-dem and nep-eur
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Citations: View citations in EconPapers (31)

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Related works:
Working Paper: Roadblocks on the Road to Grandma’s House: Fertility Consequences of Delayed Retirement (2015)
Working Paper: Roadblocks on the Road to Grandma's House: Fertility Consequences of Delayed Retirement (2014)
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