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No. 100, 1997 Montgomery, Mark R. and Cynthia B. Lloyd. "Excess fertility, unintended births and children's schooling," Policy Research Division Working Paper no. 100. New York: Population Council. Abstract Much of the rationale for family planning programs rests on the view that such programs enable women and their families to avoid the costs of unintended pregnancy and birth. There are many such costs to consider, but among these, strikingly little research has explored the costs imposed by unintended births for human capital investments in children. These costs may fall upon the unintended child himself or herself; and they may be borne in part by siblings. This research focuses on investments in children’s schooling as one important dimension in which the costs of unintended births may be manifested. We also explore the implications of departures from family-size ideals, termed excess fertility, a concept related to, but distinct from, unintended fertility. Data for the analysis are drawn from four Demographic and Health Surveys, those of the Dominican Republic, Egypt, Kenya, and the Philippines. We find evidence suggesting that unwanted and excess births reduce educational attainment in the Dominican Republic and the Philippines, but find no such effects in Kenya or Egypt. The social and family-level factors that may lie behind such differential consequences are discussed at length. | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
