Offline effects of online connecting: the impact of broadband diffusion on teen fertility decisions

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• 作者：Melanie Guldi ; Chris M. Herbst
• 关键词：Fertility ; Birth rates ; Broadband ; New media
• 刊名：Journal of Population Economics
• 出版年：2017
• 出版时间：January 2017
• 年：2017
• 卷：30
• 期：1
• 页码：69-91
• 全文大小：811 KB
• 刊物主题：Population Economics; Labor Economics; Demography; Social Policy;
• 出版者：Springer Berlin Heidelberg
• ISSN：1432-1475
• 卷排序：30

文摘

Broadband (high-speed) internet access expanded rapidly from 1999 to 2007 and is associated with higher economic growth and labor market activity. In this paper, we examine whether the rollout also affected the social connections that teens make. Specifically, we look at the relationship between increased broadband access and teen fertility. We hypothesize that increasing access to high-speed internet can influence fertility decisions by changing the size of the market as well as increasing the information available to participants in the market. We seek to understand both the overall effect of broadband internet on teen fertility and the mechanisms underlying this effect. Our results suggest that increased broadband access explains at least 7 % of the decline in the teen birth rate between 1999 and 2007. Although we focus on social markets, this work contributes more broadly to an understanding of how new technology interacts with existing markets.