IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/kap/reveho/v17y2019i3d10.1007_s11150-019-09453-2.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Does having children affect women’s entrepreneurship decision? Evidence from Nigeria

Author

Listed:
  • Joseph Boniface Ajefu

    (University of the Witwatersrand)

Abstract

This paper investigates the impact of fertility on women’s entrepreneurship decision in Nigeria, using the 2008 and 2013 cross-sectional Demographic Health Surveys data. In order to mitigate the potential endogeneity associated with fertility decision, the study explores an exogenous variation in family size using twin births in an instrumental variable (IV) analysis. Both the Ordinary Least Squares (OLS) and Two-Stage Least Squares (2SLS) estimate show that having children is positively associated with women’s entrepreneurship decision, and there are heterogeneous effects across the subsamples by women’s age. The results of this study are robust to using the number of children younger than age five in the home as an alternative definition of fertility.

Suggested Citation

  • Joseph Boniface Ajefu, 2019. "Does having children affect women’s entrepreneurship decision? Evidence from Nigeria," Review of Economics of the Household, Springer, vol. 17(3), pages 843-860, September.
    • Handle: RePEc:kap:reveho:v:17:y:2019:i:3:d:10.1007_s11150-019-09453-2
    DOI: 10.1007/s11150-019-09453-2
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://link.springer.com/10.1007/s11150-019-09453-2
    File Function: Abstract
    Download Restriction: Access to full text is restricted to subscribers.
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1007/s11150-019-09453-2?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    As the access to this document is restricted, you may want to search for a different version of it.

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Heath, Rachel, 2017. "Fertility at work: Children and women's labor market outcomes in urban Ghana," Journal of Development Economics, Elsevier, vol. 126(C), pages 190-214.
    2. Rosenzweig, Mark R & Wolpin, Kenneth I, 1980. "Life-Cycle Labor Supply and Fertility: Causal Inferences from Household Models," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 88(2), pages 328-348, April.
    3. Linda N. Edwards & Elizabeth Field-Hendrey, 2002. "Home-Based Work and Women's Labor Force Decisions," Journal of Labor Economics, University of Chicago Press, vol. 20(1), pages 170-200, January.
    4. Cruces, Guillermo & Galiani, Sebastian, 2007. "Fertility and female labor supply in Latin America: New causal evidence," Labour Economics, Elsevier, vol. 14(3), pages 565-573, June.
    5. Boden, Richard Jr., 1996. "Gender and self-employment selection: An empirical assessment," Journal of Behavioral and Experimental Economics (formerly The Journal of Socio-Economics), Elsevier, vol. 25(6), pages 671-682.
    6. Grant Miller & B. Piedad Urdinola, 2010. "Cyclicality, Mortality, and the Value of Time: The Case of Coffee Price Fluctuations and Child Survival in Colombia," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 118(1), pages 113-155, February.
    7. Bronars, Stephen G & Grogger, Jeff, 1994. "The Economic Consequences of Unwed Motherhood: Using Twin Births as a Natural Experiment," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 84(5), pages 1141-1156, December.
    8. Francavilla, Francesca & Giannelli, Gianna Claudia, 2011. "Does family planning help the employment of women? The case of India," Journal of Asian Economics, Elsevier, vol. 22(5), pages 412-426, October.
    9. Ebrahim Azimi, 2015. "The effect of children on female labor force participation in urban Iran," IZA Journal of Labor & Development, Springer;Forschungsinstitut zur Zukunft der Arbeit GmbH (IZA), vol. 4(1), pages 1-11, December.
    10. Dante Contreras & Gonzalo Plaza, 2010. "Cultural Factors in Women's Labor Force Participation in Chile," Feminist Economics, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 16(2), pages 27-46.
    11. Peter J. Kuhn & Herb J. Schuetze, 2001. "Self-employment dynamics and self-employment trends: a study of Canadian men and women, 1982-1998," Canadian Journal of Economics, Canadian Economics Association, vol. 34(3), pages 760-784, August.
    12. Sprague, Alison, 1988. "Post-war Fertility and Female Labour Force Participation Rates," Economic Journal, Royal Economic Society, vol. 98(392), pages 682-700, September.
    13. Cowling, Marc & Taylor, Mark, 2001. "Entrepreneurial Women and Men: Two Different Species?," Small Business Economics, Springer, vol. 16(3), pages 167-175, May.
    14. Sandra E. Black & Paul J. Devereux & Kjell G. Salvanes, 2005. "The More the Merrier? The Effect of Family Size and Birth Order on Children's Education," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 120(2), pages 669-700.
    15. Mark R. Rosenzweig & Junsen Zhang, 2009. "Do Population Control Policies Induce More Human Capital Investment? Twins, Birth Weight and China's "One-Child" Policy," The Review of Economic Studies, Review of Economic Studies Ltd, vol. 76(3), pages 1149-1174.
    16. Angrist, Joshua D & Evans, William N, 1998. "Children and Their Parents' Labor Supply: Evidence from Exogenous Variation in Family Size," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 88(3), pages 450-477, June.
    17. Joyce P. Jacobsen & James Wishart Pearce III & Joshua L. Rosenbloom, 1999. "The Effects of Childbearing on Married Women's Labor Supply and Earnings: Using Twin Births as a Natural Experiment," Journal of Human Resources, University of Wisconsin Press, vol. 34(3), pages 449-474.
    18. Florian Noseleit, 2014. "Female self-employment and children," Small Business Economics, Springer, vol. 43(3), pages 549-569, October.
    19. Xiaobo He & Rong Zhu, 2016. "Fertility and Female Labour Force Participation: Causal Evidence from Urban China," Manchester School, University of Manchester, vol. 84(5), pages 664-674, September.
    20. Buvinic, Mayra & Gupta, Geeta Rao, 1997. "Female-Headed Households and Female-Maintained Families: Are They Worth Targeting to Reduce Poverty in Developing Countries?," Economic Development and Cultural Change, University of Chicago Press, vol. 45(2), pages 259-280, January.
    21. Reuben Gronau, 1974. "The Effect of Children on the Housewife's Value of Time," NBER Chapters, in: Economics of the Family: Marriage, Children, and Human Capital, pages 457-490, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    22. Besamusca, Janna & Tijdens, Kea & Keune, Maarten & Steinmetz, Stephanie, 2015. "Working Women Worldwide. Age Effects in Female Labor Force Participation in 117 Countries," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 74(C), pages 123-141.
    23. Henriette Engelhardt & Alexia Prskawetz, 2004. "On the Changing Correlation Between Fertility and Female Employment over Space and Time," European Journal of Population, Springer;European Association for Population Studies, vol. 20(1), pages 35-62, March.
    24. Julio Cáceres-Delpiano, 2012. "Can We Still Learn Something From the Relationship Between Fertility and Mother’s Employment? Evidence From Developing Countries," Demography, Springer;Population Association of America (PAA), vol. 49(1), pages 151-174, February.
    25. Anderson, Siwan & Eswaran, Mukesh, 2009. "What determines female autonomy? Evidence from Bangladesh," Journal of Development Economics, Elsevier, vol. 90(2), pages 179-191, November.
    26. Zhang, Junchao, 2017. "A dilemma of fertility and female labor supply: Identification using Taiwanese twins," China Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 43(C), pages 47-63.
    27. Daniela Del Boca & Silvia Pasqua & Chiara Pronzato, 2009. "Motherhood and market work decisions in institutional context: a European perspective," Oxford Economic Papers, Oxford University Press, vol. 61(suppl_1), pages 147-171, April.
    28. de Jong, Eelke & Smits, Jeroen & Longwe, Abiba, 2017. "Estimating the Causal Effect of Fertility on Women’s Employment in Africa Using Twins," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 90(C), pages 360-368.
    29. Mayra Buvinic & Monica Das Gupta & Ursula Casabonne, 2009. "Gender, Poverty and Demography: An Overview," The World Bank Economic Review, World Bank, vol. 23(3), pages 347-369, November.
    30. Raquel Carrasco & Mette Ejrnæs, 2003. "Self-employment in Denmark and Spain: Institution, Economic Conditions and Gender differences," CAM Working Papers 2003-06, University of Copenhagen. Department of Economics. Centre for Applied Microeconometrics.
    31. Becker, Gary S, 1985. "Human Capital, Effort, and the Sexual Division of Labor," Journal of Labor Economics, University of Chicago Press, vol. 3(1), pages 33-58, January.
    32. Nadia Simoes & Nuno Crespo & Sandrina B. Moreira, 2016. "Individual Determinants Of Self-Employment Entry: What Do We Really Know?," Journal of Economic Surveys, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 30(4), pages 783-806, September.
    33. Orbeta, Aniceto Jr. C., 2005. "Children and the Labor Force Participation and Earnings of Parents in the Philippines," Discussion Papers DP 2005-20, Philippine Institute for Development Studies.
    34. Jacob Mincer, 1962. "Labor Force Participation of Married Women: A Study of Labor Supply," NBER Chapters, in: Aspects of Labor Economics, pages 63-105, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    35. Jorge M. Agüero & Mindy S. Marks, 2011. "Motherhood and Female Labor Supply in the Developing World: Evidence from Infertility Shocks," Journal of Human Resources, University of Wisconsin Press, vol. 46(4), pages 800-826.
    36. Douglas Staiger & James H. Stock, 1997. "Instrumental Variables Regression with Weak Instruments," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 65(3), pages 557-586, May.
    37. Peter R. Fallon & Robert E. B. Lucas, 2002. "The Impact of Financial Crises on Labor Markets, Household Incomes, and Poverty: A Review of Evidence," The World Bank Research Observer, World Bank, vol. 17(1), pages 21-45.
    38. Guo, Rufei & Li, Hongbin & Yi, Junjian & Zhang, Junsen, 2018. "Fertility, household structure, and parental labor supply: Evidence from China," Journal of Comparative Economics, Elsevier, vol. 46(1), pages 145-156.
    39. Imbens, Guido W & Angrist, Joshua D, 1994. "Identification and Estimation of Local Average Treatment Effects," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 62(2), pages 467-475, March.
    40. Rosenzweig, Mark R & Wolpin, Kenneth I, 1980. "Testing the Quantity-Quality Fertility Model: The Use of Twins as a Natural Experiment," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 48(1), pages 227-240, January.
    41. Pernilla Andersson Joona, 2017. "Are mothers of young children more likely to be self-employed? The case of Sweden," Review of Economics of the Household, Springer, vol. 15(1), pages 307-333, March.
    42. Browning, Martin, 1992. "Children and Household Economic Behavior," Journal of Economic Literature, American Economic Association, vol. 30(3), pages 1434-1475, September.
    43. James W. Albrecht & Per-Anders Edin & Marianne Sundström & Susan B. Vroman, 1999. "Career Interruptions and Subsequent Earnings: A Reexamination Using Swedish Data," Journal of Human Resources, University of Wisconsin Press, vol. 34(2), pages 294-311.
    44. Helmut Farbmacher & Raphael Guber & Johan Vikström, 2018. "Increasing the credibility of the twin birth instrument," Journal of Applied Econometrics, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 33(3), pages 457-472, April.
    45. James Vere, 2007. "“Having it all” no longer: Fertility, Female Labor supply, and the new life choices of Generation x," Demography, Springer;Population Association of America (PAA), vol. 44(4), pages 821-828, November.
    46. Macpherson, David A., 1988. "Self-employment and married women," Economics Letters, Elsevier, vol. 28(3), pages 281-284.
    47. Wellington, Alison J., 2006. "Self-employment: the new solution for balancing family and career?," Labour Economics, Elsevier, vol. 13(3), pages 357-386, June.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Chu, Yu-Wei Luke & Cuffe, Harold E. & Doan, Nguyen, 2020. "Motherhood Employment Penalty and Gender Wage Gap Across Countries: 1990–2010," MPRA Paper 99866, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    2. Chhavi Tiwari & Srinivas Goli & Anu Rammohan, 2022. "Reproductive Burden and Its Impact on Female Labor Market Outcomes in India: Evidence from Longitudinal Analyses," Population Research and Policy Review, Springer;Southern Demographic Association (SDA), vol. 41(6), pages 2493-2529, December.
    3. Chu, Yu-Wei Luke & Cuffe, Harold E & Doan, Nguyen, 2021. "Motherhood Employment Penalty and Gender Wage Gap Across Countries: 1990–2010," Working Paper Series 9446, Victoria University of Wellington, School of Economics and Finance.
    4. Öberg, Stefan, 2018. "Instrumental variables based on twin births are by definition not valid (v.3.0)," SocArXiv zux9s, Center for Open Science.
    5. Ojong, Nathanael & Simba, Amon & Dana, Leo-Paul, 2021. "Female entrepreneurship in Africa: A review, trends, and future research directions," Journal of Business Research, Elsevier, vol. 132(C), pages 233-248.

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. de Jong, Eelke & Smits, Jeroen & Longwe, Abiba, 2017. "Estimating the Causal Effect of Fertility on Women’s Employment in Africa Using Twins," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 90(C), pages 360-368.
    2. Semih Tumen & Belgi Turan, 2023. "The effect of fertility on female labor supply in a labor market with extensive informality," Empirical Economics, Springer, vol. 65(4), pages 1855-1894, October.
    3. Finlay, Jocelyn E., 2021. "Women’s reproductive health and economic activity: A narrative review," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 139(C).
    4. Chhavi Tiwari & Srinivas Goli & Anu Rammohan, 2022. "Reproductive Burden and Its Impact on Female Labor Market Outcomes in India: Evidence from Longitudinal Analyses," Population Research and Policy Review, Springer;Southern Demographic Association (SDA), vol. 41(6), pages 2493-2529, December.
    5. Vo, Thang T. & Truong, Thiet-Ha, 2023. "Gender division of household workforce in Vietnam: Role of international trade and fertility," Economic Analysis and Policy, Elsevier, vol. 80(C), pages 1696-1718.
    6. Oliveira, Jaqueline, 2016. "The value of children: Inter-generational support, fertility, and human capital," Journal of Development Economics, Elsevier, vol. 120(C), pages 1-16.
    7. Zhang, Junchao, 2017. "A dilemma of fertility and female labor supply: Identification using Taiwanese twins," China Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 43(C), pages 47-63.
    8. Lundborg, Petter & Plug, Erik & Rasmussen, Astrid Würtz, 2014. "Fertility Effects on Female Labor Supply: IV Evidence from IVF Treatments," IZA Discussion Papers 8609, Institute of Labor Economics (IZA).
    9. Bhalotra, Sonia & Clarke, Damian & Walther, Selma, 2022. "Women's Careers and Family Formation," GLO Discussion Paper Series 1120, Global Labor Organization (GLO).
    10. Anna Baranowska-Rataj & Anna Matysiak, 2016. "The Causal Effects of the Number of Children on Female Employment - Do European Institutional and Gender Conditions Matter?," Journal of Labor Research, Springer, vol. 37(3), pages 343-367, September.
    11. Damian Clarke, 2018. "Children And Their Parents: A Review Of Fertility And Causality," Journal of Economic Surveys, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 32(2), pages 518-540, April.
    12. Chu, Yu-Wei Luke & Cuffe, Harold E. & Doan, Nguyen, 2020. "Motherhood Employment Penalty and Gender Wage Gap Across Countries: 1990–2010," MPRA Paper 99866, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    13. Guo, Rufei & Li, Hongbin & Yi, Junjian & Zhang, Junsen, 2018. "Fertility, household structure, and parental labor supply: Evidence from China," Journal of Comparative Economics, Elsevier, vol. 46(1), pages 145-156.
    14. Yanhua Wu & Lingyun Tong & Yingying Yi, 2024. "Does Having More Children Affect Women’s Informal Employment Choices? Evidence from China," Journal of Family and Economic Issues, Springer, vol. 45(3), pages 562-578, September.
    15. Angrist, Joshua D & Evans, William N, 1998. "Children and Their Parents' Labor Supply: Evidence from Exogenous Variation in Family Size," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 88(3), pages 450-477, June.
    16. Petter Lundborg & Erik Plug & Astrid Würtz Rasmussen, 2017. "Can Women Have Children and a Career? IV Evidence from IVF Treatments," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 107(6), pages 1611-1637, June.
    17. Cáceres, Julio, 2008. "Keeping the best for last. Impact of fertility on mother's employment. Evidence from developing countries," UC3M Working papers. Economics we086832, Universidad Carlos III de Madrid. Departamento de Economía.
    18. Florian Noseleit, 2014. "Female self-employment and children," Small Business Economics, Springer, vol. 43(3), pages 549-569, October.
    19. Daniel Aaronson & Rajeev Dehejia & Andrew Jordan & Cristian Pop-Eleches & Cyrus Samii & Karl Schulze, 2021. "The Effect of Fertility on Mothers’ Labor Supply over the Last Two Centuries [Semiparametric instrumental variables estimation of treatment response models]," The Economic Journal, Royal Economic Society, vol. 131(633), pages 1-32.
    20. Besamusca, Janna & Tijdens, Kea & Keune, Maarten & Steinmetz, Stephanie, 2015. "Working Women Worldwide. Age Effects in Female Labor Force Participation in 117 Countries," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 74(C), pages 123-141.

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:kap:reveho:v:17:y:2019:i:3:d:10.1007_s11150-019-09453-2. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Sonal Shukla or Springer Nature Abstracting and Indexing (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://www.springer.com .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.