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The Child Quantity–Quality Trade-Off

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Handbook of Labor, Human Resources and Population Economics

Abstract

This chapter reviews the growing literature on the child quantity–quality (QQ) trade-off. During the transition from the traditional agricultural economy to modern economic growth, household real income increases, fertility decreases, and human capital investment per child increases. Motivated by this observation, economists started to develop theoretical models of the child QQ trade-off in the 1970s. Macroeconomic models that theoretically incorporate the QQ trade-off flourish. As a parallel development, empirical studies exploit multiple sources of exogenous variations in family size, such as twin births, child sex composition, and family planning policies, to identify the causal effect of fertility on child quality. Dialogues between theoretical and empirical analyses should empower future research on the child QQ trade-off.

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Acknowledgments

Responsible Section Editor: Klaus F. Zimmermann.

The article has benefited from valuable comments of the editors, anonymous referees, Haoming Liu, Xiying Liu, Mark Rosenzweig, and Le Wang. Rufei Guo acknowledges financial support from the National Natural Science Foundation of China (No. 71803144) and the Fundamental Research Funds for Central Universities of China. Junjian Yi acknowledges financial supports from Peking University (No. 7100603788) and the National Natural Science Foundation of China (No. 8206100449). Junsen Zhang acknowledges financial support from the National Social Science Fund of China (No. 20&ZD076) and the National Natural Science Foundation of China (No. 72034006). There is no conflict of interest. Yanlong Li and Qian Wang have provided excellent research assistance. Any remaining errors or omissions are our sole responsibility.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Center for Health Economics and Management, Wuhan University, Wuhan, China

    Rufei Guo

  2. China Center for Economic Research, National School of Development, Peking University, Beijing, China

    Junjian Yi

  3. School of Economics, Zhejiang University, Hangzhou, China

    Junsen Zhang

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  1. Rufei Guo
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  2. Junjian Yi
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  1. UNU-MERIT & Princeton University, Maastricht, The Netherlands

    Klaus F. Zimmermann

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  1. Center for Population, Development and Labour Economics at UNU – MERIT, Maastricht University, Maastricht, The Netherlands

    Klaus F. Zimmermann

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Guo, R., Yi, J., Zhang, J. (2022). The Child Quantity–Quality Trade-Off. In: Zimmermann, K.F. (eds) Handbook of Labor, Human Resources and Population Economics. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-57365-6_265-1

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