Does More Mean Better? A Quasi-experimental Analysis of the Link between Family Size and Children’s Quality

(First draft) Exogenous variation in fertility from parental preferences for sibling sex-mix composition is used to identify the causal effect of family size on several outcomes associated to either the allocation of resources within the household or its influence on children’s wellbeing. Reduced form results using data from Colombia suggest that family size has negative effects on average child’s quality. Children from larger families have accumulated almost 1.3 years less of education, are less likely (24-35 percentage points) to enroll in school and almost twice more likely to be held back in school. Regarding household resources, oldest children from large families have a higher probability of sharing a room, 22 % more likely to live in a house with no connection to sewer or septic well and 28 % less likely to have access to clean water. Mothers in these households have nearly 50 % less labor participation and their oldest kids are about twice as likely to engage in labor activities or domestic chores. Children from large families are also more likely to be physically or psychologically affected by actions of domestic violence. Other less sophisticated but informative calculations using data on anthropometrics, morbidity and immunization records also fit well with the main results of the quasi-experimental research design. The evidence presented here supports the idea of an existing taste for the number instead of quality of children, regardless of the interdependence in prices between them