The Influence of Education and Family Policies on Age at First Birth

Abstract

Age at first birth has become an important population policy issue in Europe after a relatively steep decline, followed by stabilization, in total fertility to reach an exceptionally low level. Fertility postponement has played an important role in this population transition. Low fertility has contributed to negative natural population growth in a number of European countries. The aim of this chapter is to study the variation in age at first birth in DIALOG countries, paying special attention to the possible influence exerted by educational level on this event. The educational association of the postponing effect on age at first birth will be further elaborated by classifying DIALOG countries according to their family policies. Europe is divided into Western Europe and Central/Eastern Europe when it comes to age at first birth. On average, Western European women have their first child when they are four years older than women in Central and Eastern Europe. According to the survey results, postponement of the first birth was only happening in the West in the 1990s and in the early 2000s. As a consequence, the difference in age at first birth was indeed increasing between these two European regions. These results indicate that some social traditions are highly persistent in family life in the former state-socialist countries. Education has made a difference to age at first birth in all the DIALOG countries. Highly-educated women have their first child roughly three years later than less well-educated women. This effect has remained unchanged in recent years. In the West, education has been more closely associated with the first birth in recent times than was previously the case; in the East, by contrast, this association has been lessening. In the analyses of associations between four family policy regimes and age at first birth, only the imposed home care regime made a real difference to family-founding age. Age at first birth was significantly lower in countries belonging to this family policy type. It is disputable whether this difference was due to the new family policy approach adopted in the 1990s in these post-communist countries, or whether it was a result more of different traditions and family resources.