國家社會經濟發展與總生育率之關係: 追蹤資料門檻模型的實證分析

On the Socio-economic Development and Total Fertility: An Empirical Study Using Panel Threshold Model

王雅瑄(Ya-Hsuan Wang)

指導教授 ： 林世昌

國立臺北大學/社會科學學院/經濟學系/碩士(2011年)

摘要

本文參考 Myrskyla et al. (2009) 一文, 以人類發展指標 (HDI) 代表一國之社會經濟發展程度, 探討國家社經發展與總生育率 (TFR) 之間是否存在反轉關係。 我們蒐集 143 個國家涵蓋 1980 至 2007 年的追蹤資料, 以 Hansen (1999) 追蹤資料門檻模型估計兩者關係 (TFR vs. HDI) 反轉的門檻個數及門檻值, 並了解不同社經發展程度下 HDI 對總生育率的影響方向。 此外, 本文特將資料依照門檻估計值分組後, 分析 HDI組成變數對總生育率的個別影響, 提出相對應的政策建議。 另外, 為了控制影響總生育率的其他重要變數, 本研究亦將女性勞動參與率納入實證模型。
實證結果顯示國家社經發展程度與總生育率關係出現二次反轉, 兩者關係隨著國家社經發展程度進步而出現 “正–負–正” 的變化。 觀察 HDI 組成變數對總生育率的影響, 發現出生預期壽命對總生育率的影響關係同樣出現二次反轉, 顯示健康因素可能是造成 TFR vs. HDI 關係改變的潛在變數。 控制女性勞動參與率後, TFR – HDI 的反轉關係依舊存在。

關鍵字

總生育率 ； 人類發展指標 ； 門檻模型

並列摘要

Based on Myrskyla et al. (2009), this thesis adopts the Human Development Index (HDI) as a country’s social-economic development level to detect the existence of the TFR-HDI reversal relationship. We employ panel threshold model (Hansen, 1999) to estimate the number and value of the threshold, and analyse how the HDI affects TFR under different social-economic development levels. In addition, according to the value of thresholds, we divide data into several groups, and then explore the influence of HDI components on TFR. In order to control other important variables affecting TFR, we also include female labour participation rate (FLP) to the regression model.
Our empirical result shows that the relationship between countries’ socio-economic development level and TFR appears to be non-linear. The HDI v.s. TFR reveal a change in a pattern of “positive – negative – positive”. When inspecting each HDI component on TFR, two thresholds are found in the influence of life expectancy at birth on TFR, indicating that health condition might be the crucial to cause the change of TFR-HDI relationship. After controlling FLP, the two reversals between TFR-HDI are still found in this study.

並列關鍵字

Total fertility rate ； Human development index ； Threshold model

參考文獻

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