Television and fertility: evidence from a natural experiment

• Published in: Empirical economics Vol. 64; no. 3; pp. 1025 - 1066
• Main Authors: Bönisch, Peter, Hyll, Walter
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: Berlin/Heidelberg Springer Berlin Heidelberg 01.03.2023; Springer Nature B.V
• Subjects: Children & youth; Consumption; Econometrics; Economic theory; Economic Theory/Quantitative Economics/Mathematical Methods; Economics; Economics and Finance; Experiments; Families & family life; Fertility; Finance; Hypotheses; Income distribution; Insurance; Labor market; Management; Opportunity costs; Robustness; Role models; Soap operas; Statistics for Business; Television programs; Television viewing; East Germany; Germany; D12; Fertility; TV consumption; J13; C26; Natural experiment
• ISSN: 0377-7332; 1435-8921
• DOI: 10.1007/s00181-022-02278-6

In this paper, we study the effect of television exposure on fertility. We exploit a natural experiment that took place in Germany after WWII. For topographical reasons, Western TV programs, which promoted one/no child families, could not be received in certain parts of East Germany. We find robust evidence that access to West German TV results in lower fertility. This conclusion is robust to alternative model specifications and different data sets. Using individual level information on TV consumption, we employ IV techniques to estimate the direct effect of Western TV consumption on fertility. By using aggregate level fertility data, we furthermore show the robustness of our analysis in a difference-in-difference setting. Our results suggest that individual fertility decisions are affected by role models or information about other ways of life promoted by media.