Full Citation

Title: Industrialization and Fertility in the Nineteenth Century: Evidence from South Carolina

Citation Type: Journal Article

Publication Year: 2012

ISBN:

ISSN: 1471-6372

DOI: 10.1017/S0022050711002476

NSFID:

PMCID:

PMID:

Abstract: Economists frequently hypothesize that industrialization contributed to the United States’ nineteenth-century fertility decline. I exploit the circumstances surrounding industrialization in South Carolina between 1881 and 1900 to show that the establishment of textile mills coincided with a 6–10 percent fertility reduction. Migrating households are responsible for most of the observed decline. Higher rates of textile employment and child mortality for migrants can explain part of the result, and I conjecture that an increase in child-raising costs induced by the separation of migrant households from their extended families may explain the remaining gap in migrant-native fertility.

Url: https://www-cambridge-org.ezp2.lib.umn.edu/core/journals/journal-of-economic-history/article/industrialization-and-fertility-in-the-nineteenth-century-evidence-from-south-carolina/EF50A5B2E7BA8C6BDDBCC1067C35CD25

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Authors: Wanamaker, Marianne H.

Periodical (Full): The Journal of Economic History

Issue: 1

Volume: 72

Pages: 168-196

Data Collections: IPUMS USA

Topics: Fertility and Mortality

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