Child-Care Availability and Fertility in Norway

摘要

Over one-half of the global population lives in countries with a total fertility rate below the replacement level of 2.1 births. In other words the average woman has less than one daughter surviving to adulthood, and thus the population is not replacing itself. The decline in the number of countries with high fertility rates (and rapidly increasing populations) has been welcomed for a variety of reasons; yet the emergence of below-replacement fertility in more than 60 countries has raised its own setof concerns. First, in many countries fertility rates are so low that, absent massive immigration, they imply dramatic population aging and rapid population decline, which, in turn, are linked to numerous economic and social policy concerns. Additionally, low fertility can have its own inertia. No country has rebounded to replacement-level fertility after having a TFR below 1.5 for a decade or more. Some scholars claim the existence of a low-fertility trap (Lutz and Skirbekk 2005), whereby the societyaccepts and young adults expect very small families. (See related arguments in Fernandez and Fogli 2005; Sacerdote and Feyrer 2008.) Even the recent fertility upturn in some countries (Goldstein, Sobotka, and Jasilioniene 2009) leaves those countries well below the replacement level.