Role of Population Policies in Fertility Decline: A Comparative Analysis of Lowered Birth Rates in People's Republic of China, The republic of Korea, Japan and the United States

Students are currently enrolled in primary schools, middle schools, high schools, and universities in the two communities. The data also touch upon the students’ current family size, parents’ family size, families’ Socio-Economic Status (SES), Parents’ occupations, educational levels, parents’ number of siblings, desired age of marriages well as parents’ place of birth.

At the core of this study is the assumption that population policies have indeed affected the size of the current families, thus the observed decline in birth rates in the respective countries. Moreover, the authors suggest that the effect of the population policies upon the next generation of parents could be ascertained by measuring their attitudes regarding the “expected” number of children as reflected in their responses to the notions of ideal, likely, and realistic number of children envisioned for themselves.

Our data suggest a direct relationship between the sample students’ expected family size and the current Total Fertility Rates (TFR) observed in the respective countries. The socio-economic impact of our findings with some surprising results will be discussed as well.