When the Last Big Arrow Was Loosed: How the One-Child Policy relaxations reshaped fertility trends in China

Anqi Li, Shiko Maruyama and Yangyang Zhang

Discussion papers from Research Institute of Economy, Trade and Industry (RIETI)

Abstract: In 2016, China's Universal Two-Child Policy ended the decades-long One-Child Policy. Fertility rose through 2017 and then fell, fueling claims that the reform's effects were transitory. Using the China Family Panel Studies and province-year exemption histories since the 1980s, we reconstruct couple-year second-child eligibility and estimate its causal effect. Eligibility raises the second-birth probability by 7.1 percentage points, with effects persisting for at least a decade. Counterfactual simulations imply that relaxations lifted the TFR level but left its secular downward slope largely intact, highlighting the distinction between a temporary spike, an upward level shift, and a genuine reversal of decline.

Pages: 91 pages
Date: 2026-01
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Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:eti:dpaper:26001

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