Employment uncertainty and fertility: a meta-analysis of European research findings

The impact of employment uncertainty on fertility represents a prominent topic in demographic research since ever. With the advent of the Great Recession, papers addressing this relation are now booming. Although uncertainty is usually deemed to be a negative condition, however, different fertility reactions are both advocated by sociological theories and supported by micro-level evidence, which is still fragmented and contradictory. In this article, we perform a meta-analysis (i.e., a quantitative literature review) of previous research findings for Europe in order to synthesize the existing literature and offer general conclusions about the (changing) size and direction of the impact of employment uncertainty on fertility across time and between countries.