Papers
Peer-reviewed Publication:
Descendants over 300 years: Marital Fertility in Five Lineages in Qing China, Asia-Pacific Economic History Review (2023)
This paper studies the marital fertility of five Chinese lineages since the seventeenth century, mainly in Qing (1644-1911) China. The results demonstrate a unique pattern of Chinese marital fertility by exploiting new genealogical data and studying more than 50,000 individuals from five lineages. Contrary to the conventional wisdom on Chinese fertility, the marital fertility rates in the period were moderate, and lower than those of Northwest Europe in certain periods. On the other hand, in line with the classic ideas, this paper finds no clear indication of two fertility controls within marriages, parity-dependent early stopping and parity-dependent longer birth spacing. The results suggest marital fertility in imperial China was a unique combination of moderate rates with no deliberate limitations.
Survival of the literati: Social status and reproduction in Ming–Qing China, Journal of Population Economics (2023)
This study uses the genealogical records of 36,456 men from six Chinese lineages to test one of the fundamental assumptions of the Malthusian model. Did higher living standards result in increased reproduction? An empirical investigation of China between 1350 and 1920 finds a positive relationship between social status and net reproduction. Degree and office holders, or the literati produced greater than twice as many surviving sons as non-degree holders. The analysis explores the impact of social status on both the intensive and extensive margins of fertility—namely, reduction in child mortality and better access to marriages. The high income and strong kin network of the literati greatly contributed to their reproductive success.
Journal of Population Economics, published online. https://doi.org/10.1007/s00148-023-00960-2
Working Papers:
Large Families and Lasting Prosperity: The intergenerational transmission of fertility and human capital in Chinese families, 1350-1900.
This paper uses the genealogical records of 36,456 males to reconstruct the survival pattern of Chinese families by investigating the intergenerational transmission of fertility and human capital in six Chinese lineages from 1350 to 1900. I first test for a Darwinian trade-off between reproduction and long-run survival in the six lineages. The empirical results suggest an absence of a significant Darwinian trade-off. The possible optimal level of net reproduction for long-run reproductive success was seven sons, which was above the sample median of two sons. I then examine the mechanisms through which reproduction affected the long-run survival by analysing the presence of the child quantity-quality trade-off, the relationship between fathers’ fertility and two types of quality in sons: whether they could get married and whether they obtained an academic degree. Because that the practice of offering sons for adoption induced a random variation in family size, I instrument family size with the adoption practice. Both the logistic and the IV estimates suggest that a significant Beckerian trade-off was absent. It was not family size so much as father’s human capital that was of the central importance in affecting a son’s quality. The paper concludes that in Ming-Qing China, having large families was a wise choice for the privileged group – men who had keju degree could leave more male descendants in at least three subsequent generations; their sons and grandsons were also more likely to be married and to hold keju degrees.
Where were the missing girls: Re-estimating daughters’ survival in Chinese lineages, 1350-1900.
The high rate of female infanticide in imperial China is not a hidden secret. The California School argues that the Chinese constantly practiced female infanticide to limit the number of their children, but quantitative evidence is scant. This paper uses newly digitized genealogical records produced by six Chinese lineages in the Yangzi Delta to reinvestigate daughters’ survival in the Ming (1368-1644) and Qing (1644-1911) dynasties. After considering the selection biases of genealogical data, we construct two samples of 19,516 fathers and 6,000 daughters, respectively. We find that daughters were more likely to be under-reported than killed – the estimated proportion of daughters dying of infanticide and parental neglect was about 21.4 percent, and that of un-registration was about 47.5 percent. Although the rates are comparable with the estimates from the earlier works, this paper argues that female infanticide was not an effective check to population growth in late imperial China, as suggested by the California School.
With Runzhuo Zhai (University of Oxford)