Sex ratio at birth (SRB) in China seems alarming high since 1980s, the period that
China started population control policy or the one-child policy. The high SRB has
attracted Chinese public’s attention. Scholars (domestic as well international) and
policymakers have been trying to understand, explain, and even balance the high
ratio. Our paper, however, analyzes changes of SRB among a group of births
between 1910-1969 and explores possible relationship between SRB and mother’s age
at the births as well as birth order. Data used for this analysis comes from the
Healthy Longevity Survey in China in 1998 and 2000. General conclusion from the
analysis are that SRB among children born to women aged 80+ years in 1998 and
2000 shows a high level by the international standard. SRBs calculated by periods,
parity, and mother’s age at birth also are higher than the upper limit of the
international standard. There is a tendency that SRB declines with mother’s age at
births and with parity. The general trend of high SRB among the reported births is
consistent with and even higher than that since 1980+. We accept the phenomenon
of high SRB in China since 1980s and understand that there are human-made effects
on the ratio. However, we want to argue that the phenomenon is not new to China
and exists long before 1980s. What needed in researches on SRB in China are to
study the general level of SRB, analyze its trend, and evaluate historical SRB by a
standard of SRB suitable for Chinese population.