Demographic momentum and fertility responses to pronatalist policies:The case of ethnic minorities in Russia

The paper considers the impact of the Maternal Capital policy, the pronatalist measure introduced in Russia in 2007, upon fertility of Russia’s ethnic minorities. Russia’s Maternal Capital policy increased total fertility rates after its start, stimulating much discussion on whether it would result in more births or only earlier births. Effects of that policy upon different ethnic groups of the population of Russia, however, have not received systematic attention so far. Varying demographic, socioeconomic and cultural characteristics of ethnic groups in Russia provide a unique lens to assess policy responsiveness, especially in light of the general expectation that women of economically more disadvantaged ethnicities or ethnicities with more “patriarchal” cultural backgrounds can be more responsive to pronatalist policies. We run discrete event history models using IPUMS microdata from the Russian Census of 2010, and consider changes in birth probabilities after the introduction of the Maternal Capital. The analysis concentrates on births of second children as this parity transition is the first to offer eligibility to the Maternal Capital benefit. These results do not conform to the expectation that women with lower SES would be more responsive to the Maternal Capital policy: effects were not stronger among ethnicities with lower levels of education or labor marker participation among women. Overall, ethnicities with a more intense fertility decline in the period preceding the introduction of the policy showed a weaker reaction to it. This finding opens a new perspective for studying how minority groups respond to pronatalist measures. Our findings imply that the deep social changes that precipitate intense fertility decline override any sensitivity to pronatalist policies.