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This paper provides evidence on the effect of welfare reform on fertility, focusing on UK reforms in 1999 that increased per-child spending by 50% in real terms. We use a difference-in-differences approach, exploiting the fact that the reforms were targeted at low-income households. The reforms were likely to differentially affect the fertility of women in couples and single women because of the opportunity cost effects of the welfare-to-work element. We find no increase in births among single women, but evidence to support an increase in births (by around 15%) among coupled women. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The paper uses information on British women born in 1970, collected at birth and ages 5, 10 and 30, and pregnancy histories at age 30, including miscarriages, to estimate average causal effects of having a first birth before age 20 on `partnership outcomes' at age 30 for women who had such a birth. Following the methods developed by Hotz et al, the effects can be bounded under relatively weak conditions, and a consistent instrumental variable estimator exists under stronger conditions. The results suggest that a teen-birth causes a woman to fare worse in the marriage market, greatly increasing her chances of partnering with poorly educated and unemployment-prone men. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]