Fortunes of Dragons: Cohort size effects on life outcomes

Abstract

This paper examines the long-term effects of birth cohort size on life outcomes. Using administrative data from Singapore, we study the outcomes of large birth cohorts created by the Chinese superstitious practice of zodiac birth timing, where parents prefer to give birth in the year of the Dragon. This practice is followed exclusively by the Chinese majority, with no similar patterns detected among non-Chinese minorities, allowing us to differentiate cohort size effects from confounding year-of-birth effects. Despite government efforts to increase public educational resources for these cohorts, Chinese Dragons earn lower incomes and are less likely to gain admission to national universities. There is also evidence of negative externalities on non-practising populations who happen to enter the labour market at the same time as Chinese Dragons. Our analysis suggests that the adverse life outcomes are not due to selection, but rather reflect the aggregate resource implications of birth cohort size.

Supplementary material is available for this article at: https://doi.org/10.1080/00324728.2020.1864458

Keywords:

• cohort size
• cohort effect
• fertility
• education
• income
• consumption
• superstition
• externalities
• Chinese
• Singapore

Notes

1 Author names are in alphabetical order. Please direct all correspondence to Poh Lin Tan, Lee Kuan Yew School of Public Policy, National University of Singapore, LKS 02–13, 469B Bukit Timah Road, Singapore 259771; or by E-mail: [email protected]

2 Acknowledgements: We thank Hyun Soo Choi, James Choi, Nicolae Garleanu, Camelia Kuhnen, Alexander Ljungqvist, Randall Morck, Ivan Png, David Reeb, Jacob Sagi, Johan Sulaemon, Frank Yu, Washington University at Saint Louis, UNC Chapel Hill, University of Southern California, Georgetown University, George Mason University, HKUST, Hong Kong Baptist, National University of Singapore, Nanyang Technological University, PBC Tsinghua, Singapore Management University, and UNSW for valuable feedback. The authors thank the Provost’s Office, National University of Singapore, for providing administrative data. All errors are our responsibility.

3 Data availability: The data that support the findings of this study are available from the corresponding author, Poh Lin Tan, on request.