TY  - JOUR
AU  - Bailey,Martha J.
AU  - Collins,William J.
TI  - Did Improvements in Household Technology Cause the Baby Boom? Evidence from Electrification, Appliance Diffusion, and the Amish
JF  - National Bureau of Economic Research Working Paper Series
VL  - No. 14641
PY  - 2009
Y2  - January 2009
UR  - http://www.nber.org/papers/w14641
L1  - http://www.nber.org/papers/w14641.pdf
N1  - Author contact info:
Martha J. Bailey
University of Michigan
Department of Economics
611 Tappan Street
207 Lorch Hall
Ann Arbor, MI  48109-1220
Tel: 734/647-6874
Fax: 734/764-2769
E-Mail: baileymj@umich.edu

William J. Collins
Department of Economics
Vanderbilt University
VU Station B #351819
2301 Vanderbilt Place
Nashville, TN 37235-1819
Tel: 615/322-3428
Fax: NA
E-Mail: william.collins@vanderbilt.edu
AB  - More than a half century after its peak, the baby boom’s causes remain a puzzle. A new argument posits that rapid advancements in household technology from 1940 to 1960 account for this large increase in fertility. We present new empirical evidence that is inconsistent with this claim. Rapid advances in household technology began long before 1940 while fertility declined; differences and changes in appliance ownership and electrification in U.S. counties are negatively correlated with fertility rates from 1940 to 1960; and the correlation between children ever born (measured at ages 41 to 60) and access to electrical service in early adulthood is negative for the relevant cohorts of women. Moreover, the Amish, a group strictly limiting the use of modern household technologies, experienced a sizable and coincident baby boom. A final section reconciles this evidence with economic theory by allowing households to have utility over home-produced commodities that are substitutes for the number of children.
ER  -