The impact of increased child benefits on tempo and quantum of fertility in Estonia

This is the authors' abstract. We don't add key points for this paper.

BACKGROUNDOn July 1, 2017, Estonia introduced a substantial child allowance for families with three or more children, supplementing regular child benefits.This universal, non-means-tested benefit aimed to alleviate financial burdens for larger families and encourage third and higher-order births. OBJECTIVEWe examine the impact of this reform on the likelihood and timing of third births.We hypothesise that the Estonian child benefit reform had a positive impact, given that the total allowances for a family with three children amounted to 41% of the average salary at the time of implementation.