Multiple Experiments for the Causal Link between the Quantity and Quality of Children

By Joshua D. Angrist, Victor Lavy, Analía Schlosser. Journal of Labor Economics, 2010

585 citations recorded by the source corpus.

This article presents evidence on the child-quantity/child-quality trade-off using quasi-experimental variation due to twin births and preferences for a mixed sibling sex composition, as well as ethnic differences in the effects of these variables. Our sample includes groups with very high fertility. An innovation in our econometric approach is the juxtaposition of results from multiple instrumental variables strategies, capturing the effects of fertility over different ranges for different sorts of people. To increase precision, we develop an estimator that combines different instrument sets across partially overlapping parity-specific subsamples. Our results are remarkably consistent in showing no evidence of a quantity-quality trade-off.

Subfields: Gender Studies, Safety Research

View Paper: https://www.semanticscholar.org/paper/e2c02e10e6b53cf012fa8f45116aa73144c19a1c

How researchers see this paper

The researchers whose trusted networks rank it highest, strongest advocate first. Every researcher gets a different order.

In Gender Studies

In Safety Research

Citations in the corpus

Using Instrumental Variables for Inference About Policy Relevant Treatment Effects (2018, unknown): “(2005) and Angrist et al. (2010) for empirical evidence in support of the validity of the instruments.”
Family size and child outcomes: Is there really no trade-off? (2010, methodology): “A similar conclusion is drawn in Angrist et al. (2006) who combine several instrumentation strategies in a study of Israeli data. The authors state that the results are “remarkably stable in showing no evidence of a quantity-quality trade-off”. 2 The answer to the fundamental question of whether fam”
Testing the quantity–quality model of fertility: Estimation using unrestricted family size models (2016, methodology): “Other recent studies reporting no effect of family size include Angrist, Lavy, and Schlosser (2010) using data from Israel and Aaslund and Grønquist (2010) using data from Sweden.”
Causal mediation analysis in economics: Objectives, assumptions, models (2021, background): “The main implication of the equation (6) is that conditional on X, the mediator state must not be a deterministic function of the treatment, otherwise no comparable units in terms of the mediator are available across di erent treatment states (Huber, 2019).”
Beyond LATE with a discrete instrument. Heterogeneity in the quantity-quality interaction of children (2012, methodology): “Using data from the US and Isreal, Caceres-Delpiano (2006) and Angrist, Lavy, and Schlosser (2010) come to a similar conclusion.”
Household Choices and Child Development (2010, methodology): “In this case, seeing a parent not supply time to the market is consistent with (1) that parent’s wage offer being low, (2) the household utility function weight on that parent’s leisure being high, (3) that parent’s time with the child being highly productive, or any combination of (1) - (3).”
On the impact of early marriage on schooling outcomes in sub-Saharan Africa and South West Asia (2015, unknown): “Note that using more valid instruments may yield closer estimate to the population average treatment effect (Angrist et al., 2010).”
Extrapolate-Ing: External Validity and Overidentification in the Late Framework (2010, unknown): “Angrist, Lavy, and Schlosser (2010) made a similar homogeneity argument for IV estimates of the causal effects of family size on human capital (a relationship known as the “quantity–quality trade-off”).”
Beyond LATE with a Discrete Instrument (2017, methodology): “Using data from the United States and Israel, CaceresDelpiano (2006) and Angrist, Lavy, and Schlosser (2010) come to a similar conclusion.”
Do Family Wealth Shocks Affect Fertility Choices? Evidence from the Housing Market (2013, background): “Angrist, Lavy, and Schlosser (2010) find no evidence of a quantity-quality trade-off using exogenous variation in family size due to twin births and sibling-sex composition.”