A Theoretical and Empirical Model of Fertility and Married Women's Allocation of Time Over the Life Cycle

摘要

In this report the authors present a life cycle, economic model of household's conception decisions and married women's allocation of time decisions. The model enables one to examine the economic determinants of the timing of birth decisions and the interrelationships of such timing decisions with the wife's participation in the labor force. Also examined are the impacts of future uncertainty about the household's sources of income on conception and labor supply decisions. The authors utilize the theoretical framework to specify an econometrically tractable model of household conception decisions and of the wife's labor supply decisions at some stage in the household's life cycle. The model is estimated for black and white households in the United States. The authors find that economic variables, such as wages and income, significantly affect the typical household's annual conception decision and the wife's labor supply decision. The authors also find that an important source of difference in behavior across racial groups is in the wife's childcare time commitment.