1. Objectifs

Intentions :
This research aims to «calculate completed fertility rates for a number of cohorts that were impacted by the ANC [Allowance for Newborn Children], thereby providing the first analysis on whether or not the ANC had a permanent or transitory effect on fertility.» (p. 1207)

2. Méthode

Échantillon/Matériau :
Authors use «the confidential birth vital statistics from 1974 to 2011, [which they] know the province of each birth, the mother’s age, and the parity. With these three critical variables, [they] are able to look at trends in fertility between Quebec and Ontario to assess the impact of the ANC.» (p. 1212) Moreover, they use the Canadian Population Census data which «provides household information recorded on Census Day. [Theirs] main results are based on the 1991 Census and the 1996 Census. [They] also use the 1986 Census for sensitivity analysis and the 2001 Census to analyze completed fertility rates. […] To create a control group, [they] choose to examine all married or common-law women from 1987 and 1988 from the 1991 census file.» (p. 1215)

Instruments :
Questionnaires

Type de traitement des données :
Analyse statistique

3. Résumé

«[R]esults provide strong evidence to suggest that Quebec’s baby bonus did in fact accomplish its goal of increasing fertility, while simultaneously alleviating the gender preferences of parents. [For example, pronatalist] policies can encourage household births by targeting the subgroups whose fertility decisions are highly responsive to cash incentives. […] Moreover, the amount of the transfer may not be enough for high-income individuals to be induced to have another child. Mid-income families seem poised to take advantage of a baby bonus, and if structured strategically pronatalist policies can increase higher parity births. Furthermore, we find that highly educated women are more likely to participate in a baby bonus than less educated women. This encourages the reduction of the fertility rate disparity that is related to maternal education. Moreover, we are able to observe the completed fertility rates of many cohorts that were exposed to the ANC. We see that, in addition to a transitory effect where women were having their children closer together, there was also an increase in completed fertility of women aged 15 to 39, illustrating that the pro-natalist policy does have a permanent effect on fertility in Quebec. We find that among three-child households, the baby bonus was able to create more one daughter-two son families then other sibship sex compositions.» (p. 1231)