Issue: 2021/Vol.31/No.3, Pages 89-108
SELECTED SOCIOECONOMIC FACTORS CO-OCCURRING WITH HIGH FERTILITY RATE IN THE OECD COUNTRIES
Radosław Murkowski
Cite as: R. Murkowski. Selected socioeconomic factors co-occurring with high fertility rate in the OECD countries. Operations Research and Decisions 2021: 31(3), 89-108. DOI 10.37190/ord210305
Abstract
This article presents the results of examining selected factors co-occurring with high fertility rates in developed countries. Selected OECD countries at a similar stage of demographic development have been subjected to analysis. Employing cluster analysis, the selected developed countries have also been identified according to the type of adopted family policy. It has been found that the developed countries which spend more on the family policy concerning GDP are generally characterised by higher fertility rates than those which spend less. In the light of those findings, the family-policy expenditures which allow women to reconcile professional work with raising children turned out to be particularly important. The fertility rate has also been found to correlate with labour market rates, with the level of women’s professional activity in particular. Moreover, in the developed countries the relatively high fertility rate is accompanied by low rates of young people who do not work or attend school and are not in vocational training, as well as a high rate of extramarital births.
Keywords: family policy, total fertility rate, employment ratio of women, public social expenditure on families
Received: 14 December 2020 Accepted: 2 September 2021