Macroeconomic Models of the Family: Positive and Normative Analysis of Fertility Choice in Dynamic Settings

Prop ID：SES-0452473 P I：Jones，Larry E.组织：明尼苏达大学双子城分校标题：家庭的宏观经济模型：动态环境下生育选择的实证和规范分析本研究侧重于家庭决策的动态模型及其数量特性。这类决策的三个最重要的特征是：设计夫妇的联合劳动力供应决策，确定生育孩子的数量(及其时机)，以及这些孩子的教育。这项研究跟随其他人的做法，使用现代、动态、一般均衡的技术来研究这些决定是如何做出的。生育率和教育决策从本质上来说都是前瞻性的选择。这使得这套工具在这些问题上的应用特别合适。这项研究涉及定性和定量两个方面，因此，所开发的工具也将对各种其他研究有用。由于部分重点是建立量化模型，因此可以使用历史数据来检查建模假设的有效性。例如，建立的模型和开发的解决这些问题的技术是否准确地描述了家庭劳动力供应和生育率数据中看到的长期趋势？该项目的更广泛影响：这项研究的两个要素将对更广泛的科学界特别有用。首先，由于该项目建立了定量的、一般均衡的生育决策模型，并将结果与美国和其他国家的时间序列数据进行了比较，因此得出的模型可以被历史学家和人口学家用来帮助预测发展中国家人口的时间路径。这种方法将使未来的研究人员能够确定这一时间路径将如何变化，以应对未来的事件，如卫生状况的改善和社会保障制度的引入。其次，由于该项目还将现代福利经济学的标准概念扩展到人口规模是内生的环境，这些工具将是关于人口控制的辩论的有用补充。

ABSTRACTProp ID: SES-0452473 P I: Jones, Larry E. Organization: University of Minnesota-Twin Cities Title: Macroeconomic Models of the Family: Positive and Normative Analysis of Fertility Choice in Dynamic Settings This research focuses on dynamic models of family decision-making and their quantitative properties. Three of the most important features of this type of decision-making are: designing joint labor supply decisions of couples, determining the number of children to have (and their timing) and the education of these children. This research follows others in the use of modern, dynamic, general equilibrium techniques to study how these decisions are made. Both fertility and education decisions are forward looking choices by their nature. This makes the application of this set of tools to these questions particularly appropriate. The research involves both qualitative and quantitative aspects and, as such, the tools developed will be useful in a variety of other studies as well. Since part of the emphasis is on building quantitative models, historical data can be used to check the validity of the modeling assumptions. For example, do the models built and the techniques for solving them developed provide an accurate description of the long term trends that are seen in the data on family labor supply and fertility? Broader Impact of the Project: There are two elements of the research that will be particularly useful for the broader scientific community. First, since this project builds quantitative, general equilibrium models of fertility decisions and compares the results with the data from time series in the US and other countries, the resulting models can be used by historians and demographers to help forecast the time paths of population in developing countries. The methodology is such that it will allow future researchers to determine how this time path will change in response to future events such as improvements in health and the introduction of social security systems. Second, since this project also extends the standard notions of modern Welfare Economics to environments in which population size is endogenous, the tools will be a useful addition to the debate on population control.