Does the Welfare State Destroy the Family? Evidence from OECD Member Countries |
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| Authors: | Martin Halla Mario Lackner Johann Scharler |
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| Affiliation: | 1. University of Innsbruck, Austria;2. University of Linz, Austria |
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| Abstract: | We study the effect of the size of the welfare state on demographic trends in OECD member countries. Exploiting exogenous variation in public social spending, due to varying degrees of political fractionalization (i.e., the number of relevant parties involved in the legislative process), we show that an expansion in the welfare state increases fertility, marriage, and divorce rates with a quantitatively stronger effect on the marriage rate. We conclude that the welfare state supports family formation in the aggregate. Further, we find that the welfare state decouples marriage and fertility, and therefore alters the organization of the average family. |
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| Keywords: | Divorce fertility marriage risk sharing welfare state D1 D62 H31 H53 J12 J13 J18 |
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