Education and Postponement of Maternity: Economic Analyses for Industrialized Countries

This book examines various economic aspects of the role of women’s education in the postponement of maternity in these ten industrialized countries. The chapters in this book each empirically investigate one of these countries using individual or household survey data and are in particular interested in the increasing age at motherhood with the investment in education of the mother. In search of socio-economic explanations for this relationship each chapter investigates a specific related research question. This results in a book that covers a wide range of topics on the economics of fertility decisions, such as career planning motives of women, consumption smoothing motives of households and the role of institutions.