摘要：The Japanese lower fertility rate has decreased alarmingly since 1970s. We apply the Butz-Ward model to Japanese
prefecture-level data for 1965-2015 to investigate changing determinants of the declining fertility, with focus on the
role of husband's income and wife's wages. We extend the Butz-Ward model by adding a variable for female marriage
rate to avoid omitted variable bias and by conducting the subsample analysis, separately for subperiods, I(1965-1975)
and II(1980-2015) to capture the structural change, suggested by a Chow test: the structural change might have taken
place due to the rapid development of the industrial sector corresponding increase in husband's income and wife's
wages as well as the rise in female marriage rate with gradual decrease in fertility rate in the mid-1970s. The estimation
results show that the Butz-Ward model explains subperiod I(1965-1975) well. In contrast, the estimation results for
subperiod II(1980-2015) are not consistent with the Butz-Ward model. In addition, the coefficient for female marriage
rate is positive and statistically significant for all periods.
