Comparative advantage, international trade, and fertility

We analyze theoretically and empirically the impact of comparative advantage in international trade on fertility. We build a model in which industries differ in the extent to which they use female relative to male labor, and countries are characterized by Ricardian comparative advantage in either fe...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:Journal of development economics 2016-03, Vol.119, p.48-66
Main Authors: Do, Quy-Toan, Levchenko, Andrei A., Raddatz, Claudio
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
Comparative advantage
Demography
Economic models
Fertility
Infertility
International trade
Labor economics
Labor intensive
Labour economics
Studies
Trade integration
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Summary:We analyze theoretically and empirically the impact of comparative advantage in international trade on fertility. We build a model in which industries differ in the extent to which they use female relative to male labor, and countries are characterized by Ricardian comparative advantage in either female-labor or male-labor intensive goods. The main prediction of the model is that countries with comparative advantage in female-labor intensive goods are characterized by lower fertility. This is because female wages, and therefore the opportunity cost of children are higher in those countries. We demonstrate empirically that countries with comparative advantage in industries employing primarily women exhibit lower fertility. We use a geography-based instrument for trade patterns to isolate the causal effect of comparative advantage on fertility •Differences in fertility across countries can be explained by comparative advantage in production.•Countries that have a comparative advantage in industries intensive in female labor exhibit lower fertility levels.•Fertility choices exacerbate Ricardian productivity differences.
ISSN:0304-3878
1872-6089
DOI:10.1016/j.jdeveco.2015.10.006