Abstract
Previous research has established the link between individuals’ housing characteristics and their childbearing behavior. This study contributes to this literature by examining the association between first, second and third parity transitions and housing tenure and type. The study design distinguishes between owner-occupied apartments, rental apartments and owner-occupied detached houses. This study also uniquely takes into account individual housing histories in relation to later life fertility outcomes. The data used are an extract from Swedish registers covering 25% of the population. Housing information is available from 1986 to 2006, and the study follows four birth cohorts of women who are aged 15–18 when the study starts, until ages 35–38. Descriptive results on housing and childbearing transitions over the life course are complemented by event-history models to model the parity transitions. Women living in detached housing have the highest likelihood of parity transitions, while women living in rental apartments have the lowest likelihood. Although women from different housing backgrounds have similar outcomes in terms of parity and timing, housing of origin is related to housing context during childbearing transitions, and thus, serves as a good insight to individual housing norms and constraints.
Highlights
Housing and childbearing trajectories are interlinked over the life course
In addition to examining housing type and tenure, this study considers the timing of residential moves in relation to the timing of childbearing
This study analysed the relationship between housing and childbearing using a cohort perspective, drawing on Swedish register data and following a 25% sample of the 1968–1971 birth cohorts over 20 years
Summary
Housing and childbearing trajectories are interlinked over the life course. Adequate housing is an important factor for fertility, residential migration often precedes childbearing and constraints that hamper residential migration can serve to delay or prevent family transitions (Clark et al, 1994; Feijten & Mulder, 2002; Kulu & Steele, 2013; Lo, 2012; Mulder, 2006; Öst, 2012a). Researchers have previously identified a number of housing characteristics as important for childbearing, including the type of housing (multi-family vs single-family dwelling) (Kulu & Steele, 2013; Kulu & Vikat, 2008), the security of the housing situation and the housing tenure (rented or owner-occupied) (Mulder & Wagner, 2001; Murphy & Sullivan, 1985; Vignoli et al, 2013), the affordability of the housing (Clark et al, 1994; Courgeau & Lelievre, 1992), access to the housing market (Mulder & Billari, 2010), and housing conditions including size and urban location (Kulu & Boyle, 2009; Kulu et al, 2007; Ström, 2010) While all of these factors have been found significant determinants. The final stage of the analysis is to examine the interaction between duration of a housing spell and housing type, and the relative risks of each parity transition
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