IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/vid/yearbk/v6y2008i1p125-147.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

The impact of the bonus at birth on reproductive behaviour in a lowest-low fertility context: Friuli-Venezia Giulia (Italy) from 1989 2005

Author

Listed:
  • Giovanna Boccuzzo
  • Gianpiero Dalla Zuanna
  • Marcantonio Caltabiano
  • Marzia Loghi

Abstract

As of 1 January 2000 the government of the north-eastern Italian region of FriuliVenezia Giulia (FVG) introduced a substantial bonus at birth. The birth bonus was differentiated by marital status (only married women were eligible), citizenship (only Italians were eligible), and birth order (the bonus grew for the second and especially the third birth). Moreover, the income threshold below which one got the bonus was fairly high. As of 1 January 2004 a new government substantially reduced the bonus amount as well as the upper income limit. We evaluate if the bonuses handed out in FVG during those four years (2000-03) had a significant impact on fertility and abortion choices, verifying whether fertility changed in a different way for women more affected by the new legislation. We also test if the impact of monetary measures was higher for less educated women, because in Italy the relationship between income and education is very strong, and the bonus was practically the same irrespective of income level, hence its relative impact should be stronger in a poorer family. We use two different methods: First, we compare the trends of births and abortion ratios, separately for women affected and not affected by the monetary measures, looking at the differential changes. Second, using log-linear models, we measure if the interactions among time, parity, marital status, citizenship and education are statistically significant in the direction that follows our expectations. Our results show that for low educated (and hence also less rich) women with one or (especially) two and more children, birth trends did change after 1999, whereas the trends for childless women living in FVG and for low-educated women living in other Italian regions did not change.

Suggested Citation

  • Giovanna Boccuzzo & Gianpiero Dalla Zuanna & Marcantonio Caltabiano & Marzia Loghi, 2008. "The impact of the bonus at birth on reproductive behaviour in a lowest-low fertility context: Friuli-Venezia Giulia (Italy) from 1989 2005," Vienna Yearbook of Population Research, Vienna Institute of Demography (VID) of the Austrian Academy of Sciences in Vienna, vol. 6(1), pages 125-147.
    • Handle: RePEc:vid:yearbk:v:6:y:2008:i:1:p:125-147
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://epub.oeaw.ac.at/0xc1aa500d_0x001c9ea3
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Melinda Mills & Katia Begall & Letizia Mencarini & Maria Letizia Tanturri, 2008. "Gender equity and fertility intentions in Italy and the Netherlands," Demographic Research, Max Planck Institute for Demographic Research, Rostock, Germany, vol. 18(1), pages 1-26.
    2. Gianpiero Dalla Zuanna, 2001. "The banquet of Aeolus," Demographic Research, Max Planck Institute for Demographic Research, Rostock, Germany, vol. 4(5), pages 133-162.
    3. Anne Gauthier, 2007. "The impact of family policies on fertility in industrialized countries: a review of the literature," Population Research and Policy Review, Springer;Southern Demographic Association (SDA), vol. 26(3), pages 323-346, June.
    4. Angrist, Joshua D. & Krueger, Alan B., 1999. "Empirical strategies in labor economics," Handbook of Labor Economics, in: O. Ashenfelter & D. Card (ed.), Handbook of Labor Economics, edition 1, volume 3, chapter 23, pages 1277-1366, Elsevier.
    5. Bettio, Francesca & Villa, Paola, 1998. "A Mediterranean Perspective on the Breakdown of the Relationship between Participation and Fertility," Cambridge Journal of Economics, Cambridge Political Economy Society, vol. 22(2), pages 137-171, March.
    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. Gordey Yastrebov, 2016. "Intergenerational Social Mobility in Soviet and Post-Soviet Russia," HSE Working papers WP BRP 69/SOC/2016, National Research University Higher School of Economics.
    2. Nikolai Botev, 2015. "Could Pronatalist Policies Discourage Childbearing?," Population and Development Review, The Population Council, Inc., vol. 41(2), pages 301-314, June.
    3. Svetlana Biryukova & Oxana Sinyavskaya & Irina Nurimanova, 2016. "Estimating effects of 2007 family policy changes on probability of second and subsequent births in Russia," HSE Working papers WP BRP 68/SOC/2016, National Research University Higher School of Economics.
    4. Wookun Kim, 2020. "Baby Bonus, Fertility, and Missing Women," Departmental Working Papers 2011, Southern Methodist University, Department of Economics.

    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. Nicoletta Balbo & Francesco C. Billari & Melinda Mills, 2013. "Fertility in Advanced Societies: A Review of Research," European Journal of Population, Springer;European Association for Population Studies, vol. 29(1), pages 1-38, February.
    2. Marcantonio Caltabiano & Maria Gabriella Campolo & Antonino Pino, 2016. "Retirement and Intra-Household Labour Division of Italian Couples: A New Simultaneous Equation Approach," Social Indicators Research: An International and Interdisciplinary Journal for Quality-of-Life Measurement, Springer, vol. 128(3), pages 1217-1238, September.
    3. Maria Gabriella Campolo & Antonino Di Pino & Ester Lucia Rizzi, 2020. "The labour division of Italian couples after a birth: assessing the effect of unobserved heterogeneity," Journal of Population Research, Springer, vol. 37(2), pages 107-137, June.
    4. Roberto Impicciatore, 2015. "The Transition to Adulthood of the Italian Second Generation in France," European Journal of Population, Springer;European Association for Population Studies, vol. 31(5), pages 529-560, December.
    5. Chiara Saraceno, 2005. "The Reproductive Paradox of a “Strong Family” Society: The Case of Low Fertility in Italy," QA - Rivista dell'Associazione Rossi-Doria, Associazione Rossi Doria, issue 1, March.
    6. Kristen Harknett & Francesco Billari & Carla Medalia, 2014. "Do Family Support Environments Influence Fertility? Evidence from 20 European Countries," European Journal of Population, Springer;European Association for Population Studies, vol. 30(1), pages 1-33, February.
    7. Jan Van Bavel & Joanna Rózanska-Putek, 2010. "Second birth rates across Europe: interactions between women’s level of education and child care enrolment," Vienna Yearbook of Population Research, Vienna Institute of Demography (VID) of the Austrian Academy of Sciences in Vienna, vol. 8(1), pages 107-138.
    8. Maria Castiglioni & Gianpiero Dalla Zuanna, 2009. "Marital and Reproductive Behavior in Italy After 1995: Bridging the Gap with Western Europe?," European Journal of Population, Springer;European Association for Population Studies, vol. 25(1), pages 1-26, February.
    9. Melinda Mills & Katia Begall & Letizia Mencarini & Maria Letizia Tanturri, 2008. "Gender equity and fertility intentions in Italy and the Netherlands," Demographic Research, Max Planck Institute for Demographic Research, Rostock, Germany, vol. 18(1), pages 1-26.
    10. David De Wachter & Karel Neels, 2011. "Educational differentials in fertility intentions and outcomes: family formation in Flanders in the early 1990s," Vienna Yearbook of Population Research, Vienna Institute of Demography (VID) of the Austrian Academy of Sciences in Vienna, vol. 9(1), pages 227-258.
    11. Mar Llorente-Marrón & Montserrat Díaz-Fernández & Paz Méndez-Rodríguez, 2022. "Ranking fertility predictors in Spain: a multicriteria decision approach," Annals of Operations Research, Springer, vol. 311(2), pages 771-798, April.
    12. Ansgar Hudde, 2018. "Societal Agreement on Gender Role Attitudes and Childlessness in 38 Countries," European Journal of Population, Springer;European Association for Population Studies, vol. 34(5), pages 745-767, December.
    13. Joshua R. Goldstein & Tomáš Sobotka & Aiva Jasilioniene, 2009. "The end of 'lowest-low' fertility? (with supplementary materials)," MPIDR Working Papers WP-2009-029, Max Planck Institute for Demographic Research, Rostock, Germany.
    14. Clare Holdsworth & Jane Elliott, 2001. "The Timing of Family Formation in Britain and Spain," Sociological Research Online, , vol. 6(2), pages 54-70, August.
    15. Paola Di Giulio & Roberto Impicciatore & Maria Sironi, 2019. "The changing pattern of cohabitation: A sequence analysis approach," Demographic Research, Max Planck Institute for Demographic Research, Rostock, Germany, vol. 40(42), pages 1211-1248.
    16. Soo-Yeon Yoon, 2017. "The influence of a supportive environment for families on women’s fertility intentions and behavior in South Korea," Demographic Research, Max Planck Institute for Demographic Research, Rostock, Germany, vol. 36(7), pages 227-254.
    17. Hudde, Ansgar, 2016. "Fertility Is Low When There Is No Societal Agreement on a Specific Gender Role Model," EconStor Preprints 142175, ZBW - Leibniz Information Centre for Economics.
    18. Maria Rita Testa & Valeria Bordone & Beata Osiewalska & Vegard Skirbekk, 2016. "Are daughters’ childbearing intentions related to their mothers’ socio-economic status?," Demographic Research, Max Planck Institute for Demographic Research, Rostock, Germany, vol. 35(21), pages 581-616.
    19. Massimiliano Bratti & Laura Cavalli, 2014. "Delayed First Birth and New Mothers’ Labor Market Outcomes: Evidence from Biological Fertility Shocks," European Journal of Population, Springer;European Association for Population Studies, vol. 30(1), pages 35-63, February.
    20. Pau Baizan & Bruno Arpino & Carlos Eric Delclòs, 2016. "The Effect of Gender Policies on Fertility: The Moderating Role of Education and Normative Context," European Journal of Population, Springer;European Association for Population Studies, vol. 32(1), pages 1-30, February.

    More about this item

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    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:vid:yearbk:v:6:y:2008:i:1:p:125-147. 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: Bernhard Rengs (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://www.oeaw.ac.at/vid/ .

    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.