The quantity/quality of children hypothesis in developing countries: testing by considering some demographic experiences in China, India and Africa

Abstract

Initially a general regression equation is estimated, making use of cross-country data, relating the level of the total fertility rate to a range of variables, including the level of per capita real income. There is a statistically significant negative relationship between the level of the total fertility rate and real income per capita. Once the theory of the quantity-cum-quality of children hypothesis is set out formally, and in a flexible form, it is clear that this statistical relationship is not inconsistent with this theory. However, this relationship is not a strong, or convincing, test of this hypothesis. To provide more satisfactory tests of this hypothesis, additional relevant information from various developing countries is used. Information on recent demographic changes in China provides a comparatively powerful, direct test of the theory. More indirect tests of the theory are provided by drawing on data for India in the 1960s, and for sub-Saharan African countries in the 1980s and early 1990s. These various tests suggest that the quantity-cum-quality hypothesis, in its flexible form, appears to explain some of the changes in fertility rates observed in various developing countries in recent decades.