2012-01-20

Dragon baby boom

Why do seemingly irrational superstitions persist? This paper analyzes the widely held belief among Asians that children born in the Year of the Dragon are superior. It uses pooled cross section data from the U.S. Current Population Survey to show that Asian immigrants to the United States born in the 1976 year of the Dragon are more educated than comparable immigrants from non-Dragon years. In contrast, no such educational effect is noticeable for Dragon-year children in the general U.S. population. This paper also provides evidence that Asian mothers of Dragon year babies are more educated, richer, and slightly older than Asian mothers of non-Dragon year children. This suggests that belief in the greater superiority of Dragon-year children is self-fulfilling since the demographic characteristics associated with parents who are more able to adjust their birthing strategies to have Dragon children are also correlated with greater investment in their human capital.
Does fortune favor dragons

Much of Asia expects birth jump in Year of Dragon
Officials expect a baby boom not only in China and Taiwan, but in other Asian countries and territories that observe the New Year festival, including Japan, South Korea, Vietnam, Hong Kong and Macau.
Most have extremely low birth rates, reflecting a preference among young couples in these prosperous or rapidly developing societies to choose quality of life and career advancement over the responsibilities of child rearing.
But this Year of the Dragon looks to be breaking the mold. A poll in Hong Kong showed that 70 percent of couples there wanted children born under the dragon sign, while South Korea, Vietnam and China all report similar enthusiasm about dragon-year childbearing.
I dug up births and birth rate statistics for China. I made a graph for the former and found one for the latter.

I don't discern any major trends, the overall effect of the one-child policy dampens the signal. There's slight declines in the rate correlated with the economy, but not as clear as in the U.S.

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