The Old-Age Security Motive for Fertility: Evidence from the Extension of Social Pensions in Namibia
Pauline Rossi and
Mathilde Godard
No 16358, CEPR Discussion Papers from C.E.P.R. Discussion Papers
Abstract:
The old-age security motive for fertility postulates that people's needs for old-age support raise the demand for children. We exploit the extension of social pensions in Namibia during the nineties to provide a quasi-experimental quantification of this widespread idea. The reform eliminated inequalities in pension coverage and benefits across regions and ethnic groups. Combining differences in pre-reform pensions and differences in exposure across cohorts, we show that pensions substantially reduce fertility, especially in late reproductive life. The results suggest that improving social protection for the elderly could go a long way in fostering fertility decline in Sub-Saharan Africa.
Keywords: Fertility; Old-age pensions; Social security; Africa; Difference-in-differences (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: D15 H55 I38 J13 O15 O55 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2021-07
References: Add references at CitEc
Citations:
Downloads: (external link)
https://cepr.org/publications/DP16358 (application/pdf)
CEPR Discussion Papers are free to download for our researchers, subscribers and members. If you fall into one of these categories but have trouble downloading our papers, please contact us at subscribers@cepr.org
Related works:
Journal Article: The Old-Age Security Motive for Fertility: Evidence from the Extension of Social Pensions in Namibia (2022) 
Working Paper: The Old-Age Security Motive for Fertility: Evidence from the Extension of Social Pensions in Namibia (2022) 
Working Paper: The Old-Age Security Motive for Fertility: Evidence from the Extension of Social Pensions in Namibia (2020) 
Working Paper: The Old-Age Security Motive for Fertility: Evidence from the Extension of Social Pensions in Namibia (2019) 
Working Paper: The Old-Age Security Motive for Fertility: Evidence from the Extension of Social Pensions in Namibia (2019) 
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:cpr:ceprdp:16358
Ordering information: This working paper can be ordered from
https://cepr.org/publications/DP16358
Access Statistics for this paper
More papers in CEPR Discussion Papers from C.E.P.R. Discussion Papers Centre for Economic Policy Research, 33 Great Sutton Street, London EC1V 0DX.
Bibliographic data for series maintained by ().