Title: Age at marriage, female labor force participation, and parental interests
Abstract: Female âge at first marriage is one of the major determinants of fertility and of maternal and child health in a variety of societies, contemporary as well as historical, and developed as well as developing. Yet the factors determining age at marriage remain obscure. The objective of this paper is to use Coale's description of the timing of marriage and Hajnal's discussion of patterns of marriage in two kinds of societies to argue that age at marriage results from the intersection of parental and bridal interests ; that early marriage occurs when parental interests are dominant ; and that mean age at first marriage for women will rise when the economy creates labor force opportunities for young, never- married women which increase their value to their parents. This issue is investigated by examining the marriage patterns of daughters within individual sibling sets using population registers from a pre-development society, early modem (1600-1868) Japan. The policy implications of these results are that any activity which increases the value of adolescent women to their parents, and thus keeps them out of the marriage market, will increase age at marriage and hence lower fertility and maternai and child mortality.
Publication Year: 1989
Publication Date: 1989-01-01
Language: en
Type: article
Indexed In: ['crossref']
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Cited By Count: 4
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