Discussions about fertility in developed countries refer almost exclusively to the period Total Fertility Rate (TFR). We argue that the use of this indicator frequently leads to incorrect interpretations of period fertility levels and trends, resulting in distorted policy conclusions and, potentially, in misguided policies. We illustrate this with four policy-relevant examples, drawn from conte...

In this paper we conduct descriptive aggregate analyses to revisit the relation between low and lowest-low period fertility on the one, and cohort fertility and key fertilityrelated behaviors—such as leaving the parental home, marriage and female labor force participation—on the other side. First, we identify a systematic pattern of lowest-low fertility that is characterized by a rapid delay of...

Received Jun 9, 2017 Revised Nov 20, 2017 Accepted Dec 11, 2017 The size, structure, and composition of a population are affected by the fertility rates at any point of time. Many researchers took the opportunity to exploit the fertility rates in obtaining better fertility patterns for their country. The curve for the age specific fertility rate is consistent, and this feature allows the curve ...

STUDY QUESTION Does the storage time of vitrified human blastocysts negatively impact their survival, the implantation potential of embryos or the malformation rate of babies born? SUMMARY ANSWER There was no evidence that storage times of up to 6 years after vitrification (VIT) had a negative impact on blastocyst survival, the implantation potential of embryos or the malformation rate of bab...

Analysis of the 1993 National Demographic Survey in the Philippines has uncovered regional variations in fertility-related behavior. The total fertility rate ranged from 2.8 in Manila to 5.9 in Bicol and averaged 4.1 for the entire country, but contraceptive prevalence rates were not highly correlated with total fertility (Manila showed the fifth highest prevalence, and Bicol the fifth lowest)...

Scholars have been examining the relationship between fertility and unemployment for more than a century. Most studies find that fertility falls with unemployment in the short run, but it is not known whether these negative effects persist, because women simply may postpone childbearing to better economic times. Using more than 140 million US birth records for the period 1975-2010, we analyze b...

Marginal tax rate changes have the ability to affect fertility decisions by altering the opportunity cost of time through a change in the after-tax wage. Using a natural experiments framework developed to examine women’s labor force participation we investigate the effect of the Tax Reform Act of 1986 on marital fertility. The data were from the March Current Population Survey. We find the wome...

Background: infant mortality rate is one of the main health indicators for assessing the health system’s performance over the world. We aim to examine the socioeconomic and health system factors affect infant mortality in OPEC from 2004 to 2013. Methods: was used to examine the effects of some of the key explanatory factors (total fertility rate per women, GDP per capita (current US$), public h...

In March 2012, an article in The Straits Times entitled 'Freezing eggs could reverse falling birth rate' suggested that employing the latest oocyte cryopreservation techniques could both foster individual women's reproductive autonomy and impact Singapore's fertility rate, which in recent years has consistently been among the world's lowest. The article cited both local and international fertil...

Births According to provisional reports, an estimated 340,000 births occurred in the United States during April 1997. This was an 8-percent increase from the provisional number of births reported for April 1996 (314,000). The birth rate, 15.5 live births per 1,000 population, was 7 percent higher than the rate of 14.5 for April 1996. The fertility rate, 69.4 live births per 1,000 women 15–44 ye...