Please use this identifier to cite or link to this item: https://hdl.handle.net/10419/114083 
Year of Publication: 
2015
Series/Report no.: 
IZA Discussion Papers No. 9196
Publisher: 
Institute for the Study of Labor (IZA), Bonn
Abstract: 
Social scientists theorize that the inverse relationship between socio-economic status and family size represents a trade-off between the quality and quantity of children. Evaluating this hypothesis empirically requires addressing the simultaneity of the quality and quantity decisions. Researchers have used the unanticipated birth of twins as exogenous variation in family size or the sex composition of the first two children as an instrument for family size with mixed results. We exploit a different source of exogenous variation in family size. The One Child Policy (OCP) in China dramatically reduced Chinese fertility and we examine how the OCP has affected the educational attainment of Chinese migrants to the U.S. Using data from the American Community Survey (2009-2012) and a difference-in-differences strategy our results support the quality-quantity tradeoff theory. We find that education increased more for Chinese migrants born after the OCP than their counterparts from other East Asian countries.
Subjects: 
education
migration
quality-quantity tradeoff
family size
One Child Policy
JEL: 
I21
J18
Document Type: 
Working Paper

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