Conference Agenda

Exploring the existence of possible barriers that discourage the transition to second and higher-order parities is crucial in a country like Italy, where total fertility rates have been stagnating around the lowest-low threshold of 1.3 children per woman for decades, and institutional support to families is scant. In this study, we examine how different socioeconomic circumstances, gender roles within couples, and family policy measures are perceived to influence the transition to higher-order births, using a Factorial Survey Experiment implemented with a sample of 6,000 individuals of reproductive age in Italy. Respondents will be asked to ascribe fertility intentions to a fictitious couple under alternative scenarios. Our objective is to understand how both couple-specific characteristics – i.e., partners’ age, housing situation, number and age of children, partners’ employment condition, household income, and division of housework between partners – and family policy instruments – i.e., school services and

Using a counterfactual framework on administrative municipal data, we investigate the causal effect of the variations in the supply of Early Childhood Education and Care (ECEC) services on births in Italy. We find that an increase in the availability of ECEC services has a positive, statistically significant and substantially sizable effect on the number of births at the municipal level. Furthermore, these effects also hold when high ECEC coverage levels are reached, speaking against the existence of a “saturation” effect. These findings are in line with the idea that the availability of formal childcare helps to remove barriers to the realization of couples' reproductive plans, thus helping to counteract the decline in births. However, this general finding comes with two main caveats. First, substantially and statistically significant effects on births can only be achieved when the ECEC provision increases starting from low coverage rates (at least above 10%) and the increase includes a sufficiently large temporal discontinuity in the coverage rate. Second, the effects help to counter the pace of the decline in births, but not to totally reverse the trend.

In 2023, fertility in Scotland fell to a historical low, so that low fertility is regarded as one of the country’s future challenges, and the Scottish Government is committed to reduce barriers preventing individuals from starting a family. The implicit assumption is that if conditions were more favourable, people in Scotland would have more children. But is that the case?

This study answers this question by conducting Factorial Survey Experiments (FSE) on a sample of respondents of childbearing age living in Scotland. This approach, novel within demographic research, allows the appraisal of hypothetical and complex policy scenarios. The FSE questionnaire asks participants to evaluate the likely fertility response of a fictitious couple under different policy packages.

The questionnaire is structured as a series of ‘vignettes’, i.e., a description of the fictitious couple’s characteristics and of a combination of family policy measures; each vignette is followed by a question asking respondents to predict the fictitious couple’s fertility intentions in the following three years (under the depicted scenario). The vignettes’ design reflects the baseline scenario of policies currently in place; the intermediate scenario of policies debated within governmental circles; and the aspirational scenario of policies advocated for by civil society stakeholders.

This paper examines the effects of the "Equilibri" program, designed to support mothers of children under 18 in Italy’s Piedmont region. The program aims to help women who have reduced or stopped working due to motherhood. Its objective is to promote better work-life balance by improving employment opportunities for women and enhancing the quality of time spent with their children. Data was collected at two points: upon enrollment and 9-10 months later, with 321 women completing the second survey. The evaluation, conducted via randomized control trial, shows positive impacts on employment, job satisfaction, and work-family balance. Women in the treatment group reported increased participation in professional courses and extracurricular activities for their children, as well as a greater desire for another child. Interestingly, the program led to increased stress levels among participants, particularly among more educated women and those who were unemployed at the start. While participation in extracurricular activities partially explained improvements in employment, the desire to have more children appeared independent of labor market participation or life satisfaction.