Bodies of Knowledge in Reproduction: Epistemic Boundaries in the Political Economy of Fertility

Professionals compete and cooperate over how states should govern their population. Declining fertility rates in advanced economies have led to debates about how to enable those of reproductive age to have more children and to have them earlier. This springs from political and socio-economic concerns about fulfilling desired fertility rates, maintaining high levels of human capital, and supporting fiscal and pension systems. This article investigates professionals addressing declining fertility through assisted reproductive technologies (ART), including doctors, demographers and economists. These professional groups have their own bodies of knowledge on how they view fertility, fecundity and the role of women in social reproduction. They can also cooperate to create ‘issue linkages’ on ART across their professional ecologies. The article discusses how professionals apply their bodies of knowledge to the political economy of fertility. Professional bodies of knowledge directly inform how women and men are treated on fertility issues and the policy options available.     

精力分配视角下婚姻和生育对性别工资差别的影响研究

本文基于中国综合社会调查2008年微观数据,考察“高学历”群体中婚姻、生育对性别收入差异的影响。研究发现,婚姻使性别工资差异的系数扩大了44％;生育对性别工资差异的贡献度达到12．3％;男性仍具有人力资本投资优势,主要表现在工作时间和工龄上。这表明改变传统的家庭精力分配模式,增加女性在劳动力市场中的精力和实践,才能真正改变劳动力市场中性别差异。     

Skill Composition,Fertility, and Economic Growth

While high fertility persists in the poorest countries and fertility declines with per capita income in developing countries, fertility and per capita income are now positively associated across most developed countries. This paper presents a model where a U‐shaped relationship between overall fertility and per capita income reflects within country differences in workforce skill composition and household choice of occupation, fertility, and childrearing. The fraction of skilled workers rises with economic growth. By allowing for both differences in the fertility of skilled and unskilled workers and purchased childrearing inputs, we explain a poverty trap with high fertility, fertility decline with economic development, and the possible reversal of fertility decline in a developed economy where most workers are skilled.     

Fertility Decisions and Gender Differences in Labor Turnover, Employment, and Wages

A striking observation of the U.S. and other labor markets is the weak position of women in terms of job attachment, employment, and earnings relative to men. We develop a model of fertility and labor market decisions to study the impact of fertility on gender differences in labor turnover, employment, and wages. In our framework, individuals search for jobs and accumulate general (experience) and specific (tenure) human capital when they work. They can also increase their wage by moving to a job of higher quality. Labor market decisions (e.g., job acceptance and job mobility) may differ across genders: females that give birth may decide to interrupt their labor market attachment in order to enjoy the value of staying at home with their children. The model economy is successfully calibrated to match aggregate statistics in terms of fertility, employment, and wages. We find that fertility decisions generate important gender differences in turnover rates, with long lasting effects in employment and wages. These differences in labor turnover account for almost all the U.S. gender wage gap that is attributed to labor market experience by Blau and Kahn (2000, Journal of Labor Economics15(1), 1–42). The model also implies a very small role of tenure capital in accounting for wage differences between males and females (gender gap), and between females with and without children (family gap). Journal of Economic Literature Classification Numbers: E24, J13, J21, J31.     

Maybe Baby: Comparing Partnered Women's Employment and Child Policies in the EU-15

Abstract

This paper examines how child-related public policies influence women's employment in Europe. The analysis compares the difference in employment status between partnered mothers and nonmothers across the EU-15 using a wide range of self-constructed indicators of child policies such as childcare provision, parental leave, and tax-cash benefits. Using the recycled predictions method, it is possible to isolate the impact of the presence of a child from other characteristics likely to influence women's labor-market outcomes. Country-specific employment gaps among women are computed at different ages for the youngest child, for different outcomes (inactivity and part-time or full-time work), and for different levels of education. The main conclusion is that when it comes to securing equal labor-market access and conditions for mothers of young children and non-mothers, public childcare provision has the strongest impact. In the absence of public childcare, not even the most highly educated mothers can cope.     

Breeding for Africa's new smallholder maize paradigm

This paper describes the evolution of a newly emerging smallholder maize paradigm in southern Africa beginning in 1996. This new paradigm involves the breeding, extension, and adoption of a new generation of open-pollinated ‘flinty’ maize varieties that specifically address the needs of southern African smallholder farmers for seed varieties that can be replanted (recycled) and that resist drought and low fertility problems increasingly common in southern Africa. The described mechanism is the extension and breeding work of the Southern Africa Drought and Low Fertility programme (SADLF) of the Centro Internationale por la Mejoridad de Maize y Trigo (CIMMYT). This paper explains the devolution of southern African maize production in the past two decades from centralized large-scale producers to smallholder farms, signalling a shift in research and plant breeding needs. The research/extension approach described here had profound consequences beyond the technical benefits of screening maize varieties for tolerance to stress; it empowered small-scale farmers to become informed consumers of agricultural technology. The transformation of the smallholder from a passive consumer to one actively seeking the best opportunity and seed to produce food, create economic opportunities and address local social conditions is an important development in the history and sustainability of maize production in southern Africa, and one consistent with modern African history of economic liberalization in the global food economy.     

Improving the productivity of vertisols in the Accra plains of Ghana using leguminous cover crops

The productivity of the Vertisols of the Accra plains is low, in spite of its high potential fertility. This could be attributed to physical constraints and low organic matter content. A study was conducted at the Agricultural Research Centre, Kpong, to assess the suitability of Mucuna pruriens, Mimosa invisa and Stylosanthes guianensis, in short fallows, for improving the fertility, physical properties, moisture conservation and weed control in the case of these soils. Mucuna had the highest biomass of 5.3tha^?1, as opposed to 4.1tha^?1 under natural fallow. The mucuna and stylosanthes biomass had comparatively higher total N values (240.75 and 203.51kgha^?1, respectively) than mimosa and natural fallow (152.46 and 162.74kgha^?1, respectively). Soil organic carbon, one year after the incorporation of cover crops, was found to be relatively higher under the cover crops (mucuna, stylosanthes and mimosa) than it was under natural fallow. Bulk densities were thus lower under the cover crops than they were under natural fallow. Also, soils under the cover crops had higher total porosity, water infiltration rates and moisture storage than they did under natural fallow. Weed cover, 115 days after planting maize, was significantly lower in plots previously under Mucuna pruriens than it was under natural fallow, Stylosanthes guianensis and Mimosa invisa. There was a negative linear correlation between cover crop biomass and weed density (R ² = 0.593–0.805). Grain and stover yields of maize were higher under Mucuna pruriens than they were under natural fallow (138 and 70 per cent higher, respectively). Burning of the natural fallow resulted in greater weed growth than when the material was worked into the soil (41 and 8 per cent, respectively). Grain yield was significantly greater under mucuna than it was under natural fallow (3.1 and 1.3tha^?1, respectively).     

人口目标规划可行性分析方法与应用研究

以人口普查汇总数据为基础,将人口分析方法与遗传优化建模方法相结合,提出人口与计划生育目标规划可行性分析方法。以人口普查汇总数据为例展示人口与计划生育目标规划可行性分析方法计算与分析过程。     

少子老龄化下的中国养老保险财务平衡分析

少子老龄化对养老保险财务平衡的影响须放在人口、劳力力市场、养老保险体系和经济环境四个系统相互作用的框架下来考察。在此框架下从当期平衡和时期平衡的角度预测2005-2050年的财务平衡可以得出:老龄化通过对城市化率、劳动参与率、失业率的影响使赡养率提高,从而改变了缴费率和积累率,而较之降低替代率而言,提高退休年龄可更有效地缓解老龄化带来的压力。