Teenage childbearing and the welfare state

Di Nola, Alessandro, Kocharkov, Georgi, Mellert, Jan and Wang, Haomin ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0001-5971-3206 2024. Teenage childbearing and the welfare state. Macroeconomic Dynamics 10.1017/S1365100524000270

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Abstract

Teenage childbearing is a common incident in developed countries. However, teenage births are much more likely in the United States than in any other industrialized country. Most of these births are delivered by female teenagers from low-income families. The hypothesis put forward here is that the welfare state (a set of redistributive institutions) has a significant influence on teenage childbearing behavior. We develop an economic theory of parental investments and the risky sexual behavior of teenagers. The model is estimated to fit stylized facts about income inequality, intergenerational mobility, and the sexual behavior of teenagers in the United States. The welfare state institutions are introduced via tax and public education expenditure functions derived from U.S. data. In a quantitative experiment, we impose Norwegian taxes and education spending in the economic environment. The Norwegian welfare state institutions go a long way in explaining the differences in teenage birth rates between the United States and Norway.

Item Type:	Article
Date Type:	Published Online
Status:	In Press
Schools:	Business (Including Economics)
Publisher:	Cambridge University Press
ISSN:	1365-1005
Date of First Compliant Deposit:	10 September 2024
Date of Acceptance:	13 May 2024
Last Modified:	15 Oct 2024 15:01
URI:	https://orca.cardiff.ac.uk/id/eprint/171842

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