Abstract
Being more sensitive to economic fluctuations, childbearing postponement increased during the second demographic transition and was accompanied by a moderate decline in the number of children per woman and the progressive rise of mother’s age at first birth. Under the hypothesis that recessions have a marked influence on population dynamics, the present study investigates spatial changes in mother’s age at birth in Greece with the aim to assess the differential impact of economic crisis along the urban-rural gradient. The percent composition of births by mother's age class – considered a gross indicator of fertility under a changing socioeconomic context – was studied at 4 spatial scales (the whole country, administrative regions, prefectures and metropolitan areas or specific economic districts) over an economic cycle from expansion to recession (1980–2016). While stimulating childbearing postponement observed since the early 1980s, empirical results of this study indicate that the 2007 recession was quite neutral on fertility trends in Greece, consolidating the traditional divide between urban and rural areas.
Highlights
In modern societies, a longer lifespan coexists with spatially-heterogeneous population dynamics, resulting from a higher diversity in types of households and lifestyles (Martin, 1992; Lee, 2003; Blue and Espenshade, 2011; Lee and Reher, 2011)
Our study investigates the relationship between childbearing postponement and economic dynamics, controlling for the effect of territorial factors and social forces (Kotzamanis et al, 2017), with the aim to verify if the recent economic crisis has impacted regional fertility trends in Greece, as a result of the relationship between economic cycles and population dynamics
While economic forces may assume a key role in shaping fertility trends over the recession (Caldwell and Schindlmayr, 2003), demographic dynamics based on individual decisions on family formation and childbearing were demonstrated to be associated with the local context (Sobotka et al, 2011; Vrachnis et al, 2014; Matthews and Parker, 2013; Johnson et al, 2015; Goldstein and Kluge, 2016)
Summary
A longer lifespan coexists with spatially-heterogeneous population dynamics, resulting from a higher diversity in types of households and lifestyles (Martin, 1992; Lee, 2003; Blue and Espenshade, 2011; Lee and Reher, 2011). A generalized delay in childbearing has demonstrated to reflect multiple socioeconomic forces that impact fertility rates and household size (Castro Martin, 1995; Billari and Philipov, 2004; Rontos, 2007; Bongaarts, 2009; Sobotka et al, 2011; Neels and de Wachter, 2010; Ní Bhrolcháin and Beaujouan, 2012; Sobotka, 2017). Fertility fluctuations are intense under economic crisis and high unemployment rates, job instability and other forces may determine marriage postponement and later childbearing (Adsera, 2004; Billari and Kohler, 2004; Sobotka et al, 2011; Kreyenfeld et al, 2012; Simou et al, 2013)
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