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OCR for page 60
CHAPTER 2
SOCIOECONOMIC DIFFE=NTI=S IN FERTILITY
TIae evidence presented in Chapter 1 indicated that fer-
tility had already declined prior to 1970 in more
developed regions such as the Southeast, particularly
among higher-income groups, but not Hong lower-income
groups and regions. It also suggested that the overall
accelerated decline after 1970 probably resulted from the
spread of lower fertility to those latter groups. The
objective of the present chapter is to identify these
groups more precisely. This should make it possible to
focus an explanation of the post-1970 accelerated decline
more sharply on particular groups, and on specific socio-
economic changes that may have affected their reproductive
behavior c
Evidence presented in this chapter is based on data
from the public use sample of the 1970 census and the
1976 PNAD national sample survey, both of which include
questions on average parity and on births in the year
prior to the interviews Responses were tabulated by
household income, education of women, rural-urban resi-
dence, and region. Indirect estimating techniques were
used to derive total fertility rates for women in differ-
ent education and income categories. Considerable caution
is required in interpreting the results since most of the
assumptions on which the techniques are based are violated
in such an exercise. This problem is complicated by the
fact that the severity of these violations can vary
between categories of income and education into which the
population has been grouped. For example, the assumption
of constant fertility would be violated to a greater
extent among higher income and education groups if they
had been experiencing more rapid fertility decline than
lower income and education groups--the situation in
Brazil in 1970. Moreover, once the population has been
60
OCR for page 61
~1
divided into education and income classes, these cannot
be cons idered ~closed. populations, another requirement
for valid application of the techniques. Sampling error
is a further problem when such divisions are made, par-
ticularly for repor ted bir ths in the year pr for to the
interview. These biases can be reduced but not eliminated
by us ing fewer categor ies of each vat table to increase
settle size. In the study of fertility differences by
income category cited in Chapter 1, Carvalho and Paiva
( 1976) reported that such a procedure reduced the impact
of interclass mobility on their estimates. This problem
may be less ser ious for breakdowns of the population by
education than by income since most women, except the
small proportion with university education, would have
completed the it education by the time they reached thei r
late teens.
E OUCATION AND FERTILl rY DECLINE
To examine the relation between Per tility and education,
women were divided into three broad education categories,
with education defined according to years of schooling
completed: women with no schooling, those with 1-4 years
of schooling, and those with ~ or more years. This break-
down sect if ices some specif icity among higher educational
groups for a reduction in sampling error and in the mobil-
~ty bias mentioned above. In preliminary tabulations,
the effect of education on fertility varied by ruralo
urban residence, suggesting that rural and urban women
should be separated in the discussion of educational difo
f erences. To reduce the sampling error that resulted
from having so few rural women with more than 4 years of
schooling, only two rural education classes were created:
~none. and many education..
Computations of total fertility rates for women in
different education groups are based on the adapted Brass
methodology described in Indirect Techniques for Demo
graphic Estimation tUnited Nations, 1983); in this method,
r eference per Sod error in the reporting of bit ths during
the year pr for to the census or survey is corrected using
a f actor der iced f tom compar isons between repot ted par ity
at different ages and the parity that would accrue if
current fertility were cumulated (P/F ratios). Although
reference per iod error would be expected in the 1970
data, which are based on a question about births In the
last year, that error should have been minimal in the
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62
1976 survey, which recorded the date of the lash birth.
Estimates prepared for the Panel on Brazil indicated an
average P/F of 1.32 for Brazil in 1970 and 1.22 in 1976;
this falls to 1.07 in estimates of total fertility based
on advanced tabulations of the 1980 census. The 1976 P/F
ratios suggest that reference period error was still
present; one reason for this is that the survey was con-
ducted over several weeks, and the year interval identi-
f fed in Me tabulations may have excluded recent births e
The Panel on. Brazil elected to employ the P/F ratio
ad justment in 1976, as discussed further in its report.
Them problems, as well as the others mentioned above
(interclass mobility, interclase differentials in recent
fertility decline, and sampling error), have undoubtedly
affected the results reported in Table 16, which presents
entitles of total fertility for women grouped according
to educational attainment and rural-urban residence. The
results are arranged in separate panels for 1970 and 19760
The first row in each panel shows unadjusted rates based
on reported births in the precarious year; the second row
gives the average P/F ratio f or women aged 20-24 and
25-29. The unadjusted data suggest a strong negative
correlation between years of schooling and total fertil-
ity. The question arises of whether reference period
error was higher among less-educated women. In L970, the
Pi/? ratio was 1.37 for urban women with no education and
about .10 lower for urban women with some education. It
is doubtful that enough women in their twenties shifted
from the ~none. class to the 1-4 group for interclass
shifts to have accounted for this. On the other hand, it
is possible that the P/F ratio for the 5+ group may be
exaggerated since these women had been experiencing more
rapid fertility decline prior to 1910.
Although the 1916 results suggest that fertility
decline has indeed spread to lower education groups,
problems arising from P/F ratios make it very difficult
to determine how much. Interclass shifting of women may
have had a greater effect since P/F ratios dropped from
1.21 in the ~none. group to 1.07 in the 5+ group at the
Bum. time that the percent of women in the ~none. group
declined from 13.6 in 1970 to 9.5 in 1976; the 5+ cate-
gory increased from 220L to 30.7 percent. The 1976
results could also reflect higher reference period error
among less-educated women. That survey's enumerators
were better trained and supervised than those of the
census, a point which suggests that reference period
error, if present in 1976, could be related to the
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~3
TABS 16 Total Fertility Rates by Years of Schooling,
1970-76: Brazil
Years of Schooling
Urban
Rurs1
Year and
Measure Total cone 1-4 5+ None Sow
1970
1976
Unadjusted TFa 4.37 5~02 3et7 2~28 6031 5~27
P/F Ratio. 1033 1~37 1~26 1027 1~32 1~32
Adjusted TPR 5081 6090 4.74 2091 8031 6094
Percent Distribution 100.0 13~6 27~6 22~1 20~8 lSo9
Unadjusted T~ 3.64 4~51 3~26 2~22 5099 lo63
P/F Ration 1~22 1~27 1024 1007 1031 1.12
Adjusted TFR 4~42 5070 d.06 2037 7084 5018
Percent Distr ibution 100. 0 9.5 28 0 2 30.7 12.9 18 0 7
Percent Decrease
Unadl~u~t~ 16~7 l0~2 13~5 2~6 501 12~1
AdjUSt" TO 2309 17~3 14~5 18~6 5~7 25~4
Mean web at Flrst Birth
1970
1976
23028 21~86 22~7Ei 2SoO. 2ct.95 23~48
23 0 84 2lo 91 22.30 26.08 22.08 23 ~ 70
aAdjus~nts b"ed on mirage of P/F ratios for - _n aged 20-24 and 2S-29.
bBased on reported percent of coven with zero par ity, af ~ r al Badry
correction of nonreporting woven (~e United cations, 1983).
Sources s Be rived fray 3~970 census arid 1976 P - D s~1e files.
ability to recall the date of the last bir=. If so,
education, rather than the quality of interviewing, would
account for differentials in reference period error.
However, if fertility actually did decline more rapidly
between 1970 and 1976 among less~educated women, this,
too, could have inflated their P/E ratio.
Educational differentials in fertility with and
without the P/F adjustment can be humanized according to
differences between rates for women reporting a given
level of education and women with no education. In 1970,
unadjusted total fertility for urban women with 1-4 years
of school was 1.25 children lower than for women with no
schooling, and 2.74 lower for women with 5 or more years
of schooling. These differentials increased to 2.15 and
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64
3.99 children, respectively, when rates were ad justed
using observed P/F ratios. The dif ferential between
rural women with no education and some education was one
child when unadjusted data were used, and 1.37 children
with the ad justment; though rural P/F ratios are equal,
the adj ustment process increases the dif ferential between
the two groups because of the larger base rate for women
with no education. In 1976, the differential between
unadjusted fertility rates for urban women with no educe
tion and those with 1-4 years of schooling was again 1. 25
children, but decreased to 2.29 children for the 5+ group.
With the adjustment, the differentials were 1.64 children
and 3. 33 children, respectively. Either way, educational
differentials In fertility appear to narrow among urban
women (when these differentials are expressed in numbers
of children). For rural women, the opposite is true,
since the 1976 differential was 1.36 with unadjusted data
and 2. 66 af ter ache ad j ustment ~ see Figure 7 ) .
The pattern of differentials in fertility decline
between 1970 and 1976 is highly sensitive to P/F adjust-
ments. For urban women, the category that appears least
affected is the 1-4 group, whose decline was about 14
percent; however, its P/F ratios could have been biased
upward both by fertility decline and by popula~cion shifts.
For women with no education, the decline increases from
10 percent in the unadjusted rates to 17 percent after
adjustment. For women with 5+ years of schooling, the
decline increases from 3 percent to nearly 19 percent;
the P/F ratio drops from 1.27 in 1970 to 1.07 in 1976 for
that group. Although the result for rural women with no
education are not affected by the adjustment, it causes
the decline for rural women with come education to double.
It is difficult to draw firm conclusions about educa-
tional differentials in fertility decline from these
results. For urban women, unadjusted data suggest that
declines were greatest for women with 1-4 years of school.
Adjusted results suggest that declines were greater among
women with 5 or more years of schooling. since there is
reason to suspect that the 1970 P/F ratio for women in
the 5+ group was biased upward by declining fertility,
the 1970-76 decrease indicated by the adjusted data is
probably exaggerated. A conclusion, tentative at best,
is that urban fertility decline was probably more rapid
among women with less education, leading to a narrowing
of educational differentials among urban women; for rural
women, those with no education experienced the least
decline, leading to a widening in these differentials.
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61
~ 4
o
10
9
8
F
UR BAN
None
(17) -
-
'- 5 .
G I _
ul tto 4 Y - n
_ (151
5+ Years
o
1970
65
1976 1 970
YEAR
RURAL
_
\ Some
(253\
1976
FIGURE t Total Fertility Rate by Years of Schooling,
1970 and 1916: Brazz1
Note: Percent decreases shown in parentheses.
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66
I t is also important to observe that the total per-
centage fertility decline between 1970 and 1976 exceeded
the decline in all but one education/residence category
( the ad justed rates for rural women with some education) O
This is because the percentage distr ibution of women
among education/residence categories changed between 1970
and 1976. The percentage of women in the urban ~none.
class declined from 1306 percent to 9.5 percent, while
the rural ~none. dropped from 20.8 percent to 12.9
percept e The shares of the urban 5+ class increased from
2201 percent to 3007 percent, while the rural ~some.
group rose from 15.9 to 1807 percent. The urban 1-4
group was more stable in percentage terms though it is
important to recognize that this stability masks cons
siderable shifting into and out of the group as a
consequence of changes in the shares of adjacent groups.
Because of these changes in composition, the average
decline for all classes combined exceeds percentage
declines within classes.
Insights into the relationship between education and
fertility that can be extracted from tabulations of
questions on children ever born and children born in the
last year are not limited to computation of total fer-
tility ratese Tabulations of f irst bir~che from these
data mate it possible to measure educational differences
in the singulate mean age at first birth using the tech.
nique described earlier. These averages are shown in the
last panel of Table 160 In 1970, there is a difference
of less than one year between urban women in the tenoned
category and those with 1-4 years of schooling. A much
larger difference, 2. 3 years, separates the 1-4 and 5+
groups. There is a differential of about 1.5 years
between rural women with no schooling and those with some
schoolinge
The main change in 1976 is that the average age at
first birth for urban women in the 5+ group increases to
26.1 years, while the average for women in the 1-4 group
drops slightly, increasing the difference between these
groups to nearly 4 years. Since the reliability of these
measurements could have been affected by the shifting of
women from one education group to the next, by declining
fertility, and by semolina error. caution is required in
interpreting them.
.
Ilowever, it is probably safe to say
that these difference" in age at first birth are one of
the main features of educational differentials in Brazil-
ian fertility. This could be the result of later mar-
riage, labor force participation, and other aspects of
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67
the changing roles associated with increased education.
Educational differences in the singulate mean age at
marriage measure were not computed because of previously
mentioned doubts about the reliability of the reporting
of marital status.
FAMILY INCOME
Published results of the 1976 PNAD survey included tabu-
lations of fertility questions according to household
income categories (in multiples of the monthly salary at
the time of the survey). Berquo (1980) has co ~ area
estimates of total fertility based on these tabulations
to estimates of fertility by minimum salary groups in
1970 census data, with results as shown in Table 17.
These estimates suggest that the greatest decline in
total fertility between 1970 and 1976 occurred among the
lowest-income groups. This suggests important changes in
the pattern of ~ncome-related fertility differentials in
Brazil because declines prior to 1970 clearly had been
concentrated in h~gher-income groups. These changes have
stirred considerable interest in the question of why rapid
fertility decline spread to low~income women. Before this
question is explored in detail in subsequent chapters, the
remainder of the present chapter describes more precisely
TABLE 17 Total Fertility Rates by Family Income
Level (multiples of monthly minimum salary), 1970
and 1976: Brazil
Monthly Income:
Multiples of the
Minimum Salary
Total Fertility Rate
Percent
1970 1976 Decline
<1 1.66 6.11 20.2
-
<1 to <2 6.20 5.94 4.2
<2 to <5 4.35 4.07 6.4
-
>5 2.60- 2~54 2.3
Source: Berquo (1980)' using 1970 census and 1976
PNAD survey data.
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68
changes in the relationship between income and fertility
in Brazil.
There are several ways in which the rates reported in
Table 17 are ambiguous or might have been distorted. One
relates to the effect of changes in the composition of
women by income class. Again, in no group, including the
lowest-income, does the decline exceed the 24 percent
average for all groups combined, suggesting that changing
composition has been at work. The effects of changing
composition by income class are more complicated than the
changes in education described above. There is an added
problem of definition: the meaning of minimum salary
categories as indices of poverty or wealth changed over
the period from 1970 to 1976 because of deterioration in
the purchasing power of the minimum salary; thus fer-
tility changes observed for a particular minimum salary
class could reflect the movement of women into or out of
the class, or changes in the way that the class reflects
income distribution. In 1970, 39 percent of families
reported income levels of one minimum salary or less, and
21 percent had two or more. By 1976, the share of
families with less than one minimum salary had fallen to
21 percent, while those with two or more had increased to
54 percente The extent to which these shifts represent
interclass mobility rather than changes in the meaning of
minimum salary classes is ambiguous. Either could explain
why the largest fertility declines seem limited to the
lowest minim salary group. Nearly half of the worn in
the one-two class in 1976 belonged to the less than one
class in 1970, which means Mat they could well have
experienced a decline from 7066 to Se94 (22 percent), a
figure that is closer to the national average.
Another ambiguity relates to the extent to which these
changes in composition, as well as interclass differen-
tials in prior fertility decline and sailing error, may
have distorted P/F ratios used to adjust total fertility
rates reported in Table 17. If the tabulations by educa-
tional level are a valid indication, there could be major
problems.
A third ambiguity, also suggested by the education
results, arises from the possible marking of quite dif-
ferent rural and urban patterns in income group averages
that combine rural and urban women.
Access to the raw data files for both the 1970 census
sample and the 1976 PNAD survey make it possible to
experiment with alternative tabulations by income class
aimed at reducing, or at least clarifying, these distor-
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69
tions. To avoid the def initional problem arising from
categorizing income groups according to minimum salary,
families were regrouped into family income deciles (with
f amilies in multifamily households considered as separate
units). In doing this, a choice had to be made between
total family income and family income per capita. Neither
measure was entirely satisfactory: for a given level of
income, grouping by total income understated the relative
prosperity of smaller households, whereas grouping by
income per capita led to a clustering of higher-fertility
women in the lower-income category. When total fertility
rates for women categorized as low-income by both definio
tions were compared to results for women with no educa-
tion, the rate for the low per capita category was higher,
enough so that the grouping by total family income was
selected.
In tabulating questions on fertility for different
family income defiles, decile categories were grouped to
reduce sampling error and the impact of interclass
mobility. The following groups were adopted: in urban
areas, deciles 1-3 were labeled ~low,. deciles 4-6
~middle,. and defiles 7-10 ~high.; in rural areas, the
top two groups were combined because of sampling error
arising from the limited n ~ er of cases in the 7-10
category. Interclase mobility is reduced but not
eliminated by this grouping since The defiles refer to
the distribution of all families, and the composition of
groups could change as a result of changes in the
distribution of women by place of residence or income.
Total fertility rates calculated from responses to
fertility questions tabulated for groups of family income
deciles are presented in Table 18. The format of the
table is similar to that of Table 16, which described
fertility differences by educational level: unadjusted
rates in the first row, followed by observed P/F ratios,
adjusted rates, and the percentage distribution of women
in 1970 and 1976. The table also shows percentage
decreases in rates from 1970 to 1976 and singulate mean
ages at first birth for both dates.
In the unadjusted rates for 1970, total fertility for
the urban low group was actually .4 children less than
for the middle group. The reason Mat this did not show
up in Table 16 is Mat in 1970, the majority of low-incoI'ae
women resided in rural areas, which weighs heavily in the
overall low-income average. Unadjusted total fertility
for urban women in the high-income class was over 2 chil-
dren lower than for those in the middle class, and in
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70
TABLE 18 Total Fertility Rates by Family Income Dec iles,
1970-76: Brazil
F~ily Inca" Decile
Urban
Rure1
Year and
Measure To"1 ~ Middle Eligh ~ Eligh
. . ... . _ . _ .
1970
1 O7~
Unad] usted T~ ~ 0 3t ~ 0 36 ~ 0 75 2.69 6 71 ~ 0 99
P/P Batioa 1033 1038 1022 loU 1019 1053
AdJusted TF~ 5081 5.99 5.82 3088 8.00 7.66
Percent Distr ibution 100.0 10. 8 16.5 35 .8 17. 8 19 .1
Adjusted TFR 3064 3.98 3.9S 2.08 6.50 ~oll
P/l' Ratio. 1022 1.10 1014 1.45 1.03 1045
Adjusted SFR dod2 do3~7 4~52 3~02 6070 5~86
Percent Dlatribution lOOoO 12~2 18~6 37~7 13~4 ,8~1
Percent Decrease
UnadJusted TFR 16.1 8.7 16.8 22.7 3.1 17.6
Adiusted SPR 23.9 27.0 22.3 22.2 16.3 22.2
Mean Aoeb at First Birth
1970 23 o28 22.03 21e 46 25 0 16 20 ~ 51 24 ~ 28
1976 23.84 21. 32 21. S2 26 ~ 30 20.48 24 0 70
aAdjus~nts b~d on average of P/F ratioa for - _n agQd 20-~. - ~l 25-29.
bBased on reported perc~t of ~_n with zero p—~ty, af~r E1 R~ry
correction of nonreporting wc_n (~ United Nations, 1983).
Sources' Derived fr~ 1970 ce~u~ and 1976 PRaD ~p1e files.
rural areas about 1.7 children lower for middle and high
deciles combined. Unad3us ted total fertility declined by
about 17 percent overall from 1970 to 1976. Rates for
the urban low and middle groups were about the same, and
the pattern of differences ~mong other groups was similar
to that of 1970. The rural low group declined feast g
however, the weight of this group decreased, while that
of low urban women increased. The unadjusted rates
suggest that fertility decline was greater am~ng the
middle- and highoincome groupa.
The picture changes considerably when rates are
adjusted using the observed P/F ratios: incame differen-
tials narrow for both urban and rural women because of
the high P/F ratios of high-income women. This is surely
a distortion that reflects the declining fertility of
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71
women in this group. Because 1976 P/F ratios were lower
for all women except those in the urban high-income group,
the adjusted rates suggest more rapid declines than do
the unadjusted rates. The pattern of fertility decline
by income class also changes, with the adjusted rates
indicating that decline to have been greatest among low-
income urban women and least among low-income rural women.
Though the P/F ratio of high-income women is probably
distorted, there is little change in it from 1970 to 1976;
thus the percentage decline for the group is unaffected.
The insights provided by these results about income
class differentials in the level and percentage decline
of fertility between 1970 and 1976 are thus clouded by
distortions in the P/F ratios. However, they do suggest
a need to modify the conclusion reported earlier that
fertility decline was concentrated in the lowest-income
group and that little or no decline occurred at higher
levels. Moreover, the results indicate that if fertility
decline was greater among low-income women, it was among
low-income urban women; in fact, they suggest that the
rate of decline was lowest among low-income rural women.
Otherwise, the evidence reported here indicates that
fertility decline was more evenly spread across income
classes. If this is so, education may have played a more
important role than income In differentials in the rate
of decline between 1970 and 1976. There may also be an
interaction between education and income; that is, fer-
tility change may be related to a woman's level of educa-
tion, but the nature of this relation may vary by income
class.
The last bit of information about income class differs
entials in fertility relates to the measure of mean age
at first birth. The patterns here are similar to those
observed in the educational breakdowns, with a differ-
ential of about 3 years separating high-income women from
other groups in 1970 and an increase in this differential
to about 4 years for urban women in 1976. This again
raises the question of what socioeconomic forces led to
increases in age at first birth for these women and not
for women in lower income and education groups; it also
raises the question of how differences by income and
education relate to each other.
A partial answer to the last question is provided by
an examination of joint percentage distributions of women
by educational attainment and family income level, as
shown in Table 19. The base for the percentages is the
total number of women aged 15-49; thus each cell in the
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72
TABLE 19 Percent Distribution of All Women Aged 15-49 by
Income Deciles, Years in School, and Rural-Urban Residence,
1970 and 1976: Brazil
Yearn of Schooling
Urban
Rural
Year and
Income Decile alone 1-4 5+ None Some
1970
_,
Urban I.ow 4.78 4.46 1.52
Urban Middle 4.93 8.27 3.26 --
Urban High 3.83 14.83 17.29 ~ —
Rural Low ~ -- 12.20 5. 54
Rural Bigh ~ 8.73 10. 36
1976
Urban' Low 3.74 5.79 2.62 --
Urban Middle 3.46 9034 5.79 °- °
Urban High :!o32 130113 22.27 — ~
Rural Low °~ -a 7.21 6020
Rural Bigh - 5.69 12. 44
Sources: Tabulations of 1970 census and 1976 survey data files.
table shows the percent of women in a particular income/
education group, with the sum of all cells rather than
either rows or column" adding to 100 percent. The dis-
tributions show that there is a loose correspondence in
the data, but hardly an exact fit, between income level
and educational attainment. This correspondence ~ mea-
sured by comparing percentages in each cell, is closer
when one examines the distributions of educational
attainment within income groups (reading across rows);
the picture is less clear in the distribution of women by
income level within education categor ies ( reading down
COlUmnS)e There is a closer correspondence in rural
areas and at higher levels of income and education in the
urban population: for example, the majority of women
with higher educational attainment are found in higher-
income defiles. This is not true of urban women with
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73
lower educational attainment, who appear to have a better
chance of attaining the middle- or upper-income decides.
This indicates a need to take account of the role of
education and other features of the urban environment
(particularly labor force participation) in examining
differentials in fertility by income class, and vice
versa.
TEE REGIONAL DIMENSION OF INCOME DIFFERENCES
The regional dimension of decliner in total fertility by
income level is examined in Table 20.1 Rates were cal-
culated for three groups of PNAD regions, which were
combined to preserve an adequate sample size in the
tabulation by income defiles. Regions 1 and 2 (Rio de
Janeiro and Sao Paulo), which represent the highest
levels of income and socioeconomic development in Brazil,
were combined and are labeled as ~RJ-SP.. A second
combination consists of PNAD regions 3 and 4 (Parana/
Santa Catarina/Rio Grande do Sul and Minas Gerais/Espirito
Santo), which represent intermediate levels of income and
other development indicators and are labeled as ~Other..
Region 5 consists of Brazil poorest region, the North-
eastern states, so labeled. PNAD regions 6 and 7 are not
shown because only their urban population was available
in the 1976 sample. Family income groups were also con-
~olidated to reduce sampling error: in urban areas, the
lowest six and highest four deciles were combined, and
all rural women were combined. The discussion is limited
to unadjusted total fertility rates.
In 1970' previously observed (Chapter 1) patterns of
interregional differentials in fertility were maintained
within each broad category of family income. Fertility
was lowest in the high-income region and highest in the
low-income region. Interregional differentials were
greatest among low-income urban women. Within regions,
the differential between low- and high-income urban women
was greatest in the Northeast and least in Rio and Sao
Paulo. However, the differential between low-income
urban women and rural women generally {most of whom are
lower-income) is greatest in the middle group.
In 1976, the pattern charged e Most Importantly, rates
for women in middle-income regions moved closer to those
for women in Rio and Sao Paulo. In fact, the rates for
urban low-income women were lower in the "other. region,
so that the within-region differential for urban women
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74
TABLE 20 Unadjusted Total Fertility Rate by PNAD
Region and Income Decile, 1970 and 1976: Brazil
PNAD Reg ion
Year and RJ-SP Other Northeast
Decile (1-2) (3-4) (S)
1_
I_
Urban/Low-Middle 3 . 85 4 0 27 SO 41
Urban/Middle 20 47 2. 67 30 37
Rural/All 4.82 5. 62 6.39
Urban/Low-Middle 3 . S1 3. 32 4. 8S
Urban/lligh 2.01 2.04 4.43
Rural/All 4.42 4.43 6.06
Percent Decrease
. ~
Urban/Liow-Middle 8 e 8 22e 2 It) o 4
Urban/Bigh 18.6 23 0 6 2901
Rural/All 8 ~ 3 21e 2 5 o 2
Source: Unadjusted total fertility rates derived from
special tabulations of census and survey files.
was less for this region than for R;r-sp. The reason for
this is that fertility rates for all classes of women
declined more rapidly in the former. Declines were least
rapid in Rio and Sao Paula since their rates were lower
to begin with in 1970. The greatest percentage decline
occurred awns high-income urban women in the Nor~cheast,
while the lowest percentage decline was mung rural women
in that region.
In assessing these patterns, it is also important to
take account of the relative size of each region's income
classes, since both the percentage decline and weight of
each group in the total namer of women account for their
contributions to the overall fertility decline. Table 21
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f 5
TABLE 21 Percent Distr ibution of Women Aged 15-49 by PNAD
Region and Income Deciles, 1970 and 1976: Brazil
PNAD Reg ion
Other Northeast
Year and R3-SP
Decile (1-2) (3-4) {5) (6-7) Total
~ . , .
1970
1976
Urban/Low-Middle 708 7.8 9.2 2.5 27.3
Urban/High 19.9 9.0 4.7 202 35.8
Rural/~11 4. 6 150 5 160 8 a 36.9
Total 32.3 32.3 30~7 4.7 100.0
Urban/Low-Middle 9.7 8.1 9.7 3.1 31.2
Urban/High 19.1 10.7 4.7 2.3 37.4
Rural/All 3~7 13.2 14.5 a 31.4
Total 33.1 32.6 28.9 5.4 100.0
..
aRegions 6-7 included for comparison, but rural population of
these regions not included in total.
Source: Special tabulations of census and survey data files.
shows the percentage distributions of women aged 15-49 by
region and income class for 1970 and 1976. The total
number of women at each date is the base of the percant-
ages. The group with the largest share {nearly 20 per-
cent) of women--the higher-income deciles in Rio and Sao
Parlor had an 1B.6 percent fertility decline. Although
this was below the national average since this group
already had comparatively low fertility in 1970, it was
important because of the weight of this group in the
total. The group with the greatest percentage decline in
fertility--the higher-income women in the Northeast--
accounted for a relatively small share (less than 5
percent) of women (see Figure 8~.
The important groups in terms of larger weight in the
total and higher percentage declines were women in the
middle-income ~other. region. They accounted for a
little less than one-third of all women, and experienced
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76
40
30
20
10
o
Rural/MI Income Groups
UrbanlHigh Income
UrbanlLow-Middle Income
1 ~
100
~ _
.~..........
................
................
:-:-:-:-:-:~:-:-:-:-
...~.~...........
..~...~.........
....~............
::::::::::
. ~
::::::::.:
.............. ..
..................
...22".22.2. _
.-.:.: :-:-:
_
-~
CL
l_ 20
TOTAL
RIO DE JANEIRO OTHER NORTH-
SAO PAU LO EAST
80
60
40
o
FIGURE 8 Distribution of Women Aged lS-49, by Region and
Income Group, 1976: Brazil
fertility declines of 21-24 percent. Rural fertility
decline in this region was about 22 percent, and these
rural women accounted for about 14 percent of the total.
This contrasts with rural women in the Northeast, whose
decline was only 5 percent, and who accounted for a
roughly similar percentage share of all women.
These comparisons add further weight to the conclusion
stated earlier: that the spread of fertility decline to
new regions and income groups, combined with its continua-
tion among women experiencing pre-1970 declines, accounted
for the accelerated fertility declines of the 1970~.
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77
These comparisons also suggest that in the future, fertil-
ity decline at the national level will depend to an even
greater extent on declines among low-income groups in
both urban and rural areas. Fertility decline among
urban middle- and upper-middle defiles, which contributed
substantially to the declines of the 1970s, will be more
limited since the fertility of these groups has reached
comparatively low levels.
CONCLUSIONS
The objective of this chapter was to identify differences
in fertility among Brazilian women according to levels of
educational attainment and family income in 1970 and
1976, as well as differential rates of fertility decline
between these two sets of data by education and income.
A further objective was to determine the possible effects
of changes in the distribution of women by education and
income on the overall rate of decline and to pinpoint
which groups contributed most to the decline because they
had greater percentage decline-, greater weight in the
total number of women aged 15-19, or both.
The main finding of the chapter is a confirmation of
the hypothesis stated in Chapter 1 about ache reason for
Brazil8s accelerated fertility decline in the 1970~:
during the 197Os, there was continued, though slowing,
fertility decline mung middies and upper-income women in
Rio de Janeiro and Sao Paula {women who had experienced
declines prior to 1970), combined with the spread of
fertility decline to women in lower- and middle-income
regions that had experienced only limited decline before
1970. The chapter also suggests a number of lines of
analysis that might indicate why the 1970" brought the
particular combination of fertility declines that it
did. These data, while basically descriptive, suggest
that interactions between income level, educational
attainment, age, and other aspects of the socioeconomic
environment should be studied In greater detail. An
examination of links between female labor force partici-
pation, migration, and household conduction patterns is
warranted, with account taken of regional and rural-urban
dimensions of these changes. These factors will be in-
cluded in the analyses presented in the next two chapters.
The present chapter has also raised a namer of method-
ological questions, particularly about the reliability of
data on births in the year prior to the interview as
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78
tabulated for subpopulations like the income and education
groups identif I'd here. The distortions in P/F ratios
associated with the shifting of women between groups, dif-
ferential fertility between groups, and sampling error
are so severe that adj ustments based on these ratios are
questionable if not misleading. Though it would be
desirable to use data on current rather than cumulative
fertility in analyzing recent changes, the questionable
reliability of current fertility measures as applied to
subpopulations suggests that data on parity by age and
other characteristics are more likely to yield unbiased
results O Imaginative use of these data ~ such as a focus
on childIessne"s and on cohort changes ([OK example, the
difference between the average parity of women in a par-
ticular education/income class who were 20024 in 1970 and
the parity of the same group at age 26~30 in 1976) may be
a way to compensate for some of the information on recent
fertility that is lost by not using the data on births in
the last year.
Representative terms from entire chapter:
total fertility
