Completing education and the timing of births and marriage: findings from a birth-month experiment in Sweden

We investigate the timing of fertility and marriage as it depends on educational attainment utilizing a birth-month experiment in Sweden that leads to exogenous variation in the age at completing schooling. Our analysis finds that the difference of 11 months in the age at school-leaving between women born in two consecutive months, December and January the following year, implies a delay in the age at first birth of 4.9 months. This effect of delayed graduation also persists for second births and the age at first marriage, but it does not affect completed fertility or the overall probability to marry prior to age 45.