Fertility and Occupation: Mining Districts in Prewar Japan

Abstract

Many theories of demographic transition stem from attempts to explain fertility differentials across economic and social groups. These differentials typically emerge once a decline in natality commences. Thus it is commonly observed that the fertility of urban populations falls short of that recorded for agricultural districts, that the upper classes tend to precede the working classes in the adaptation of family limitation, and the like. These observations are, in turn, used to justify economic and sociological theories which, by associating both social status and economic costs and benefits with occupation and residence, account for the fertility decline in terms of status and constrained choice.