关键词: 家庭负债, 家庭杠杆率, 生育, 初育年龄

Abstract: Since the beginning of this century, the leverage ratio of household has been rapidly rising in China. The household leverage ratio has a significant impact on the household consumption and childbearing activities. This paper constructs a generalized OLG model of family fertility to empirically test the influence of household leverage ratio on fertility using the data from CFPS. The empirical results show as follows: Firstly, leverage ratio has significant negative influence on the parity-specific fertility of urban and rural households. The housing leverage ratio shows a greater impact. Secondly, there is heterogeneity in the effect of leverage ratio on fertility: urban families and families with only one house are more likely to be affected. Thirdly, the age at first birth will also significantly increase with the increase of leverage ratio, through which leverage ratio will further reduce lifetime fertility rate. Finally, this paper discusses the public policy options for reducing the fertility effect of household leverage in China.

Keywords: Household Debt, Household Leverage Ratio, Fertility, Age at First Birth