A Study on Fertility Transition in Hong Kong

Download or read book A Study on Fertility Transition in Hong Kong written by 解書影 and published by Open Dissertation Press. This book was released on 2017-01-27 with total page pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This dissertation, "A Study on Fertility Transition in Hong Kong" by 解書影, Shuying, Xie, was obtained from The University of Hong Kong (Pokfulam, Hong Kong) and is being sold pursuant to Creative Commons: Attribution 3.0 Hong Kong License. The content of this dissertation has not been altered in any way. We have altered the formatting in order to facilitate the ease of printing and reading of the dissertation. All rights not granted by the above license are retained by the author. Abstract: Abstract of the thesis entitled A STUDY ON FERTILITY TRANSITION IN HONG KONG Submitted by Xie, Shuying for the degree of Master of Philosophy at The University of Hong Kong in August 2007 The fertility rate of Hong Kong, one of the lowest in the world, together with its long life expectancy have led Hong Kong into an aging society while bringing in new challenges. In this thesis, the reasons causing such a low fertility rate were examined and suggestions to solve this problem were made. A detailed analysis was carried out on the marriage pattern of Hong Kong. A decomposition method was employed to examine the changes of the fertility rate and how the fertility decline can be accounted for by several social and economic factors. It has been shown that 56% fertility decline is attributable to the reduction of marriage rates among the Hong Kong women. Furthermore, the low birthrate outside marriage has been shown to be the main problem for the low fertility in Hong Kong when comparing with two Western countries - United States and France. A shift in the births from economically inactive females to economically active females was observed and it has partially offset the negative effect on fertility due to the increasing female labor force participation rates. Further, a compartmental model provides a different view on the probability for women to give birth. Also, a cumulative logit model was applied at an individual level from the Knowledge, Attitude and Practice Survey. It has been shown that higher education attainment of wife is a negative factor on fertility while females with a full-time job tend to have more children. Such conflicting results can be interpreted by the 'shift' of fertility of women from economically inactive to economically active due to the change of economic structure in Hong Kong. The labor participation rate has increased considerably in the past decade. The low fertility and change in nuptiality will last for several years and reverse trend has yet to be observed among the local Hong Kong women. Effective measures should be taken and policies for population would be required to ensure a sustainable development for the population can be achieved in the future. DOI: 10.5353/th_b3955718 Subjects: Fertility, Human - China - Hong Kong - Statistics Childbirth - China - Hong Kong - Statistics