Waiting as a signal: Why women are delaying fertility?

Wung Lik Ng and Yin-Chi Wang

Economic Modelling, 2020, vol. 87, issue C, 471-479

Abstract: Gone are the days when women got married and reared children at the age of 20 in developed countries. Nowadays, women are attending college and developing a career just like men. In this paper, we provide an alternative theory on why women choose not to put their early career on hold in order to have a child. Differing from the traditional human capital theory in the literature, we focus on the role of asymmetric information in the job market. We show that under asymmetric information, women have incentives to signal their career commitment. This causes a delay and a decline in fertility and a rise in educational attainment. We also examine different pro-natal policies. We find that policies subsidizing only early fertility are more efficient.

Keywords: Fertility; Timing of birth; Signaling; Asymmetric information; Female labor supply (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: D80 J13 J16 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2020
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (3)

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Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:eee:ecmode:v:87:y:2020:i:c:p:471-479

DOI: 10.1016/j.econmod.2019.12.010

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