More goals, fewer babies? On national team performance and birth rates

Authors

FUMARCO Luca PRINCIPE Francesco

Year of publication 2021
Type Article in Periodical
Magazine / Source ECONOMICS LETTERS
MU Faculty or unit

Faculty of Economics and Administration

Citation
Web https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0165176521003633
Doi http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.econlet.2021.110086
Keywords football; sporting events; time allocation; birth rates; fertility
Attached files
Description Does national team performance boost birth rates? We compiled a unique dataset combining country-level monthly birth rates for 50 European countries, over 56 years, with measures of national teams’ performance in 27 international football events. We find that an increase in national team performance in international cups is associated with a drop in the birth rate nine months after the event. We hypothesize that these results might be explained by individuals’ time allocation choices.

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