Fertility transitions in low- and middle-income countries are driven by changes in both preferences for smaller families and their implementation. Claims of an overwhelming dominance of either changing demand or … Read more
America is facing a child care crisis: care services are costly and scarce and fail to meet the needs of families. The majority of U.S. voters, Joseph Chamie opines, feel … Read more
While mortality is low in Europe, progress is slowing down and regional convergence, once notable, may have come to a halt. Markus Sauerberg, Florian Bonnet, Carlo-Giovanni Camarda, and Pavel Grigoriev … Read more
There is a longstanding interest in understanding whether children born following unplanned pregnancy could be at higher risk of negative health outcomes, including early life mortality. Using Demographic and Health … Read more
In Malawi, in a trial carried out between 2016 and 2018, children grew taller and exhibited more rapid cognitive development when their mothers’ access to family planning and reproductive health … Read more
Childlessness in Korea is rising due to delayed marriage, increasing singleness and a growing share of childless unions. Misun Lee and Kryštof Zeman show that while more years in education … Read more
Early union formation and motherhood are frequently observed in low- and middle-income countries, where heterogeneity in the timing of family formation is also high. Using Demographic and Health Surveys for … Read more
Massive internal migration in China has transformed the landscape of childhood for millions. Analyzing census data from 2000 to 2020, Mengyao Cheng, Yu Chen, Lidan Lyu, and Yu Bai find … Read more
Child benefits are never explicitly included in pension systems, although mothers often receive other forms of compensation, such as provisions for earlier retirement or higher pensions. There are good reasons … Read more
Pay-as-you-go (PAYGO) pension systems are problematic: commitments are meant to be long term, but reality changes rapidly, which forces a frequent revision of rules. Gustavo De Santis suggests an alternative … Read more
The introduction of unilateral divorce legislation in the US in the 1970s and 1980s, which led to spikes in divorce rates, coincided with rising educational assortative matching into marriage. Geghetsik … Read more
Statistics on euthanasia and assisted suicides are rarely available, in part because very few countries have legalized this form of end of life, and usually only in recent or very … Read more
With respect to other members of an origin population, migrants are selected on the basis of certain characteristics. This selection can affect economic prospects and education but also health. Elisa … Read more
Liliana Andriano shows that heatwave exposure prior to birth causes lower birthweight. Given the implications for life-long health and well-being, the study provides insights for policymakers who are concerned with … Read more
The Chinese government attaches great importance to the construction of National Forest Cities, which have proved effective not only as part of the national low-carbon environmental strategy, but also as … Read more
The Venezuelan exodus stands as the largest displacement in recent Latin American history, with around 22.5% of the population now living abroad. Drawing on data from seven of the main … Read more
In Italy, grandparents are a fundamental source of care for children, and families are the main source of support for older individuals. Margherita Moretti, Elisa Cisotto and Alessandra De Rose … Read more
The implications of inaccurate age-reporting among older people are rarely investigated. Alice Reid, Allen Kabagenyi, Stephen Wandera, Joshua Beinomugisha and Sarah Walters suggest that age-heaping may have more to do … Read more
Europe was hard-hit by the COVID-19 pandemic in 2020 and 2021. While its effects at national level are now well known, intranational differences have been less frequently investigated. Florian Bonnet, … Read more
Angela Greulich and Laurent Toulemon present a new method for measuring the educational gradient of fertility for women who are at childbearing age rather than for women who have already … Read more
Katya Ivanova and Nicoletta Balbo examine the link between societal pessimism and fertility decisions. Using prospective data from the Dutch LISS panel, the authors illustrate that broader concerns about the … Read more
Return migrants’ fertility is likely to differ from that of nonmigrants and migrants due to migration experiences, norms, adaptation, and socioeconomic factors, but knowledge of their fertility behavior is limited. … Read more
Progress in education has been uneven in sub-Saharan Africa, which may have contributed to slowing or halting fertility decline. Bruno Schoumaker and David A. Sánchez-Páez note that fertility has stalled … Read more
When measuring the demographic support ratio, including only the country’s residents may prove insufficient. Lukas Tohoff, Daji Landis, Letizia Mencarini, and Arnstein Aassve develop a novel demographic indicator to account … Read more
What has happened to traditional two-married-parent families in rural America and Canada? Shelley Clark and Matthew Brooks explore changes in rural and urban families over the past three decades to … Read more
More and more mothers with young children stay in the labor market today. In the United Kingdom, the share has risen from 62% in 1989 to 72% in 2023. However, … Read more
Using longitudinal register data for Belgium, Jonas Wood, Leen Marynissen and Dries Van Gasse find that fathers who earn less than their female partners are more likely to use parental … Read more
Mortality from cardiovascular diseases (CVDs) is the leading cause of death worldwide, in high, middle and low-income countries. Emerson A. Baptista and Bernardo L. Queiroz investigate whether CVD mortality rates … Read more
The demographic dividend describes the economic growth potential based on shifts towards a larger share of working-age population when fertility declines in the course of the demographic transition. Markus Dörflinger … Read more
Uruguay’s total fertility rate plummeted from nearly 2 children per woman in 2015 to 1.37 in 2021. As Wanda Cabella, Mariana Fernández Soto, Ignacio Pardo, Gabriela Pedetti note, this unprecedented … Read more
Living arrangements have changed over the past five decades, leading to a decline of the extended family, growth of the nuclear family and, more recently, the appearance of living alone … Read more
More and more people live in countries that have decriminalized homosexual relations, from 11% of the global population in the late 18th century to 79% in the early 21st century. … Read more
The link between religion and fertility has long interested demographers. While relevant data with the necessary extent and detail are rarely available, Finland, is an exception, as information on religious … Read more
Social inequalities in mortality expanded during the COVID-19 pandemic in Denmark. Cosmo Strozza, Serena Vigezzi, Julia Callaway, and José Manuel Aburto quantified life expectancy changes in 2020 and 2021 and … Read more
Household structures reflect and affect social, economic, and demographic dynamics. Albert Esteve and Maria Pohl use the new CORESIDENCE database to explore the transformation of households over the last five … Read more
Higher survival, not low fertility, is the main long-term driver of population ageing. Adding some new elements to an old debate among demographers, Gustavo De Santis and Giambattista Salinari illustrate … Read more
In Australia, according to Ewa Jarosz, Anna Matysiak and Beata Osiewalska, mothers of one child are more likely to have a second birth if certain conditions are met, and notably … Read more
Are Americans feeling better or worse since the 1970s and does this pattern vary by gender and race? Jason L. Cummings explores U.S. trends in self-rated health inequalities over the … Read more
In the prominent political debates about population decline and ageing, short-term changes in the period total fertility rate (TFR) are the main point of reference, even though they can be … Read more
The racial divide is still profound in the U.S., in terms not only of survival, and survival without disabilities, but also of happiness. Anthony R. Bardo and Jason L. Cummings … Read more
The gender wage gap persists, especially among mothers. Alícia Adserà and Federica Querin show that despite low wages in predominantly male occupations that depend on heavy machinery, women (and chiefly … Read more
What are the trends in the prevalence of child support agreements in the US? Apparently declining, based on frequently used stock data, but in fact stable or even on the … Read more
Over the last decades, the working population in Europe has become older, more feminized, and more educated. However, Álvaro Mariscal‐de‐Gante, Amaia Palencia‐Esteban, Sara Grubanov‐Boskovic and Enrique Fernández‐Macías argue that female occupational … Read more
Frailty represents a major public health challenge in ageing populations. In this study, Sergi Trias-Llimós, Magali Barbieri, Viviana Egidi, Luisa Frova, Francesco Grippo, France Meslé, Marilena Pappagallo, and Aline Désesquelles … Read more
On October 18, 2023, the International Union for the Scientific Study of Population (2023) broadcast a Yes-or-No debate on the statement: “The population of humans that can be supported sustainably … Read more
Ultra-Orthodox Jewish communities are known to have high fertility, but details are difficult to investigate because questions about religion and fertility are rarely asked together in surveys. Lyman Stone’s ingenious … Read more
Households are important units of social, psychological and economic support for children, and variation in the presence of household members at different times can determine child survival. Ashira Menashe-Oren, Yacouba … Read more
Over the last decades, survival prospects have generally increased worldwide. Using data from the Global Burden of Disease project, Iñaki Permanyer and Octavio Bramajo investigate how mortality and morbidity have … Read more
The under-investigated issue of co-impairment (cognitive impairment and limitations in basic activities of daily living) is more prevalent than commonly believed. Shubhankar Sharma, Jo Mhairi Hale, Mikko Myrskylä and Hill … Read more
The gender gap in labor force participation is expanding in China, for various reasons, among which scarcity of affordable public childcare and growing discrimination against women in the labor market. … Read more
As union dissolution becomes more frequent around the world, the living arrangements of children of separated parents have become an important issue. Joint physical custody (JPC) is believed to be … Read more
Women in sub-Saharan Africa (SSA) experience high prevalence rates of anaemia and HIV, resulting in an average of 14.3 years of reproductive-age life expectancy spent in poor health. Audrey M. … Read more
Little is known about the composition of kinship groups and family members outside the household, and how this evolves by age and over time. Martin Kolk and colleagues, exploiting exhaustive … Read more
In the United States, the Hispanic population was hit harder by the COVID-19 pandemic than the majority (non-Hispanic White) population. Elizabeth Arias and Betzaida Tejada-Vera investigate the matter and highlight … Read more
Latin America faces a unique societal challenge: high numbers of young adults, especially women, who neither work nor pursue education, known colloquially as “nini.” Using census microdata for 12 countries, … Read more
Rapid population aging may undermine the viability of the German pension system. Is working longer a remedy? Christian Dudel, Elke Loichinger, Sebastian Klüsener, Harun Sulak, Mikko Myrskylä analyse what is … Read more
The number of countries that aim to raise fertility has markedly increased over recent decades. Among policy instruments used to achieve this goal, parental leave schemes play an important role. … Read more
China’s population boom is over: demographic aging and decline will characterize its foreseeable future. However, according to Wang Feng, this will not entail a decrease in the standard of living … Read more
Sex-selective migration leads to imbalances in local proportions of young women and men. In almost all European and American countries, substantially more women than men migrate from rural to urban … Read more
Between the 9th and 3rd centuries BCE, the Greeks founded more than 500 colonies throughout the Mediterranean basin. According to Norma Lonoce, Gianpiero Dalla-Zuanna, Pier Francesco Fabbri, Stefano Vassallo and … Read more
Black women in the US have higher fertility than White women, but this difference does not emerge consistently at all educational levels. Emma Zang and Aparajita Kaphle document these education-specific … Read more
Using lifetime data for baby boomers from 15 European countries, Aude Bernard shows that (i) children from higher socioeconomic backgrounds are more likely to migrate and (ii) individuals who migrated … Read more
An increasing number of people in high-income countries marry or cohabit with partners who were born abroad. Using census microdata for Spain and the United States, Albert Esteve, Annika Elwert … Read more
Recent decreases in fertility rates in European countries have fueled gloom and doom about the prospect of shrinking populations. As Nick Parr shows, the levels of fertility that would sustain … Read more
All over the world, children’s education mirrors that of their parents. This, together with differential fertility, affects the distribution of educational outcomes in the next generation. In Sweden, however, differential … Read more
Old age is frequently marred by ill health. Socioeconomic conditions, too, play their part: the poorest also suffer from worse health conditions in Chile, as Pedro Olivares-Tirado and Rosendo Zanga Pizarro show, … Read more
Is it better to intermarry? Using Swedish registry data, Anna Oksuzyan, Sven Drefahl, Jennifer Caputo, and Siddartha Aradhya investigate whether people married to someone from a different ethnic background (i.e., … Read more
As marriage declines and divorce increases, partnership trends and household composition become increasingly determined by trends in the formation and dissolution of non-marital cohabiting unions. Marika Jalovaara and Linus Andersson … Read more
Launched in 2009, the Joint Programming Initiative “More Years Better Lives” (JPI-MYBL) brought together several EU and non-EU countries to create a common research framework aiming to better coordinate, harmonize, … Read more
The future of the Italian population depends in large part on migration. Marcantonio Caltabiano and Gianpiero Dalla-Zuanna compare the most recent forecasts of net migration for Italy proposed by Eurostat, … Read more
Does health deterioration manifest at increasingly (dis)similar ages? Iñaki Permanyer, Francisco Villavicencio and Sergi Trias-Llimós explore inequalities in age-at-morbidity onset globally, and find these to be larger than lifespan inequalities. … Read more
After quantifying and comparing the intensity of competition in local marriage markets for unmarried (internal) migrants in their hometown and in their destination place, Wanru Xiong finds that in China, … Read more
Feelings of loneliness are not very widespread among European older adults (aged 50 years and over) according to SHARE data. And, surprisingly enough, according to the analysis of Omar Paccagnella, … Read more
With rising infertility and increasing demand for fertility treatments globally, understanding the role of medically assisted reproduction (MAR) in population demographics and family formation patterns has never been more important. … Read more
Moroccan and Turkish older migrants in the Netherlands frequently feel lonely, not because they lack social relationships, Tineke Fokkema & Marjolijn Das note, but because of poorer health, lower socio-economic … Read more
Longevity Blue Zones are regions of the world where the population has exceptional longevity. Until recently, four of them had been identified: the Nicoya peninsula in Costa Rica, and three … Read more
The pre-COVID literature established that lacking a partner or children was among the risk factors for loneliness among older people. Bruno Arpino, Christine A. Mair, Nekehia T. Quashie, and Radoslaw … Read more
The outbreak of the Covid-19 pandemic highlighted the importance of accurately counting deaths, classifying them by age, sex, place of residence and cause. Although formally mandatory since 1969, death registration … Read more
Children are not all equally influenced by parental separation. Wiebke Schulz shows that children with parents from a lower educational background have fewer chances of completing mid-secondary education. This is … Read more
In Sweden, a positive association is emerging between income and fertility, Martin Kolk observes. Men and women with higher income have more children than their less wealthy peers, and the … Read more
There is a positive association between tertiary education and internal migration across Europe. Miguel González-Leonardo, Aude Bernard, Joan García-Román and Antonio López-Gay find that this holds also for immigrants: they … Read more
Population aging is contributing to an increase in loneliness around the world. Lauren Newmyer, Ashton M. Verdery, Haowei Wang, and Rachel Margolis explore loneliness among late-middle-aged and older adults and … Read more
Racial disparities in socio-economic and health outcomes are a topic of concern in the United States. As Deepthi Kolady and Weiwei Zhang show, they have also played a major role … Read more
Rashid Javed and Mazhar Mughal investigate how son preference affects birth spacing in Pakistan. The impact they find is strong, with several negative consequences on the demographic transition of the … Read more
Premature drops in estrogen from early menopausal age may increase the risk of disease and death in later life. To understand what influences early menopausal onset, we looked at the … Read more
How does adolescent fertility affect high school completion for boys and girls in Chile? Controlling for socioeconomic and academic selectivity, Viviana Salinas and Valentina Jorquera-Samter find that a teenage mother … Read more
America leads advanced developed countries in terms of guns per capita and homicide rates, although with substantial variation by state, gender, and major racial/ethnic groups. Given its policies on police, … Read more
Low and declining female labour force participation in India has been a puzzle and a key policy question in the recent past. Chhavi Tiwari and Srinivas Goli argue that it … Read more
In addition to their childcare responsibilities, women with young children often have to do more housework, thus making an already unequal balance even more skewed. Zsuzsanna Veroszta shows that, in … Read more
Norwegian register data indicate that parents’ mental health deteriorates prior to union dissolution but improves afterwards. In contrast, Øystein Kravdal and Jonathan Wörn note, children seem to experience a continued … Read more
India’s economic sector faces a reckoning with its ageing population. Aparajita Chattopadhyay and David E. Bloom‘s analysis, based on the Longitudinal Aging Study in India (LASI), indicates that health is … Read more
Benedetta Scotti1 examines the relationship between late-career trajectories and post-retirement mortality in Italy. She finds that exposure to employment instability in later working life, an increasingly prevalent phenomenon in many … Read more
The benefits of the Olympic Games may be numerous and long lasting. Chao Guo highlights the positive role of the 2008 Beijing Olympic Games in reducing the risks of both … Read more
Gender inequality in the division of housework persists. Elisa Brini, Anna Zamberlan and Paolo Barbieri investigate if cultural heritage is resistant to changes in socioeconomic and institutional environment by studying … Read more
Until recently, child survival in India was lower among Muslims than among Hindus, despite the lower average socio-economic status of the former. Dibyasree Ganguly and Srinivas Goli note that this … Read more
Endogamy (partners of the same geographical origin) is said to lower the risk of marriage dissolution. However, once cohabitation is included in the analysis of Belgian (register) data, Layla Van … Read more
The centrality of women’s economic empowerment in achieving the sustainable development goals has attracted high level policy interest. Data limitations impede knowledge of its extent in Africa. Demographic and health … Read more
An interview with Vladimir Gimpelson, director of the Centre for Labour Market Studies at the Higher School of Economics in Moscow, the Russian Federation. Introduction The Bell is a Moscow … Read more
Status exchange is a leading factor behind the rising share of educational hypogamy marriages in India (women marrying less educated men), says Koyel Sarkar. Lower caste women aspire to upward … Read more
Besides its morbidity and mortality effects, COVID-19 gave rise to several non-pharmaceutical policy interventions affecting citizens’ social and economic conditions. Veronica Toffolutti et al. find that these measures negatively affected … Read more