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Title: Male Incarceration and Teen Fertility

Citation Type: Miscellaneous

Publication Year: 2007

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Abstract: This paper argues that the increase in young male incarceration rates played a significant role in the decline in teen birthrates during the 1990s. Using 1980, 1990, and 2000 Census microdata, I show that a one standard deviation increase in white (black) young male incarceration rates was associated with a 1.12 (2.15) percentage point decline in the fertility of white (black) female teens in the lowest income quintile. Incarcerating one additional white (black) male is associated with 0.28 (0.45) fewer births. Teen fertility is negatively related only to the incarceration rates of males empirically likely to father the babies of teen mothers, such as 20 year-old males or males of the same race. Instrumenting for incarceration with court orders on jail overcrowding magnifies the estimates considerably, suggesting that the OLS estimates may understate the true causal impact of incarceration on teen fertility. My results suggest that models of sex ratios and bargaining power for teenagers need to allow for heterogeneity in the types of male sexual partners.

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Authors: Kamdar, Amee

Publisher: University of Chicago

Data Collections: IPUMS USA

Topics: Crime and Deviance, Fertility and Mortality

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