External shocks, household consumption and fertility in Indonesia.

Autor/inn/en	Jungho Kim; Fürnkranz-Prskawetz, Alexia
Titel	External shocks, household consumption and fertility in Indonesia.
Quelle	Vienna: Vienna Inst. of Demography (2006), 33 S. PDF als Volltext kostenfreie Datei (1); PDF als Volltext kostenfreie Datei (2) Link als defekt meldenVerfügbarkeit
Reihe	Working Papers / Vienna Institute of Demography. 04/2006
Sprache	englisch
Dokumenttyp	online; Monographie; Graue Literatur
Schlagwörter	Fertilität; Schock; Soziale Sicherung; Bildungsinvestition; Investition; Konsum; Versicherung; Wirtschaft; Arbeitspapier; Haushaltseinkommen; Indonesien
Abstract	This paper examines the impact of idiosyncratic income shocks on household consumption, educational expenditure and fertility in Indonesia, and assesses whether the investment in human capital of children and fertility are used to smooth household consumption. Using six different kinds of self-reported economic hardships, our findings indicate that coping mechanisms are rather efficient for Indonesian households that perceive an economic hardship. Only in case of unemployment we find a significant decrease in consumption spending and educational expenditure while fertility increases. Theses results indicate that households that perceive an unemployment shock use children as a means for smoothing consumption. Regarding the death of a household member or natural disaster we find that consumption even increases. These results are consistent with the argument that coping mechanisms even over-compensate the actual consumption loss due to an economic hardship. One important lesson from our findings is that different types of income shock may lead to different economic and demographic behavioral adjustments and therefore require specific targeted social insurance programs.
Erfasst von	ZBW - Leibniz-Informationszentrum Wirtschaft, Kiel
Update	2014/4