People in Transition Flashcards
gender-related development index (GDI)
global gender gap index
GDI measures the inequality between the sexes in:
- life expectancy
- education
- standard of living
GGGI:
- Economic participation and opportunity
- Educational attainment
- Political empowerment
- Health and survival
parent education and children
the higher the parent education, the fewer children
economic prosperity and birth rate
Economic prosperity favours an increase in the birth rate, while increasing costs lead to a decline in birth rate.
Recession and unemployment are also lined with a decline in the birth rate. This is related to the cost of bringing up a child.
Whether the cost is real or imagined does not matter.
Demographic Transition Model (DMS)
stages of a population
High Stationary: Stage 1
- Crude birth AND crude death rates are high, due to famine, disease and war
- Growth is slow, oscillates, periods of decline occur
- Pre-industrial society, mostly agrarian: hill tribes in Papua New Guinea (no country in world is in stage 1, only small parts of nations)
Early Expanding: Stage 2
- Death rate declines, IMR declines, life expectancy increases due to new introduce health care, infrastructure and education. No war and sufficient food increases longevity.
- Birth rate remains high because norms governing fertility take more time to change:
- cultural lag - families still have a lot of children because they think they need them (e.g. for their land and farming) even though they don’t due to improved medicine and other factors
- The rate of natural change increases
- Examples: Niger, Madagascar, Haiti
Late Expanding: Stage 3
- There is a population lag: over time social norms adjust which causes lower birth rates
- Examples: Brazil, Thailand, Morocco
Low Stationary: Stage 4
see model above…
Natural Decrease: Stage 5
- Birth rate falls below the death rate
- In the absence of migration, populations fall
- Examples: Germany, Italy
population momentum
the tendency for population growth to continue beyond the time that replacement level fertility has been achieved, because of a relatively high concentration of people in the child-bearing years
• This situation is due to past high fertility rates which results in a large number of young people (population lag)
factors affecting fertility
- Demographics (as a result of high IMR)
- Socio/Cultural (religion)
- Political (pro/anti natalist policies)
- Economic (LEDC’s for work, MEDC’s see the costs of the child negatively)
- The more educated women (and families) are, the less children they have.
- Religion is that an important factor, when it comes to children being born. The reason is that these religious people are often also not very educated and therefore get more children.
- The higher the mortality rate, the higher the fertility rate — child replacement.
- The number of children are not increasing (peak of producing children), because the majority of the world are getting only 2 children per women (constant). The world population is still growing because of population momentum. (the great fill up - old die off, and the next generation is being born (same height of boxes)
intermediate variables that affect fertility
Fecundity: ability to conceive, have intercourse and carry a baby to term
Sexual unions (sexual intercourses):
- formation and dissolution of relationships
- age of first intercourse
- proportion of women who are married or in a relationship
- frequency of intercourse
- sexual abstinence (religious or cultural customers)
Birth Control: contraceptives, abortion, or sterilisation
why is the crude death rate a poor indicator of mortality trends?
because grey countries have many old populations that die naturally, in contrast to Nigeria
why does life expectancy globally increase?
- miminum health care
- safe water supplies (better infrastructure)
- political stability (less conflicts)
- vaccinations against major diseases
- overall socieeconomic progress
- medical and scientific innovations
Spectacular progress in reducing deaths among children under five in the last few decades is projected to continue. There were 21 million such deaths in 1955, about 10 million in 1997, and that figure should decline to 5 million by 2025.
In terms of premature deaths, the gap between rich and poor countries remain huge, but are gradually closing, because one can get only so old.
In rich countries the life expectancy of babies born after 2000 are over 100 years.
People in rich nations survive chronic illnesses, such as cancers and heart conditions, because they are diagnosed earlier and get better treatment, and the good working conditions (+ shorter working weeks) might further increase health and life expectancy.
what significantly affects the average life expectancy of a country?
Countries with high Infant mortality rate will bring down the average life expectancy significantly!
benefits of population pyramids and meanings of:
wide base
narrow base
straight or near-vertical sides
concave slope
buldges in the slope
deficits in the slope
they help planners find out how many services and facilities, such as schools and hospitals, will be needed in the future
- A wide base suggests a high birth rate
- A narrow base indicates a falling birth rate
- Straight or near-vertical sides show a low death rate
- A concave slope suggests a high death rate
- Bulges in the slope indicate high rates of immigration. For instance, excess males of 20-35 years could be economic migrants looking for work. An excess of both male and female cohorts (age groups) could be due to a baby boom. Excess elderly, usually female, might indicate a community of retired people.
- Deficits in the slope show out-migration or age-specific or sex-specific deaths (such as epidemics or war)
depedency ratio (formula and limitations)
limitations: exceptions are not included in the ratio:
- unemployment
- longer education (graduating)
- elderly working past 65
- economically active aged group — staying home
- child labour
sependency ratios can be shown on a triangular graph
pros and cons of a youthful population:
potential advantages
- Large potential workforce
- Lower medical costs
- Attractive to new investment
- Source of new innovation and ideas
- Large potential market for selected goods
- Development of services such as schools, creches
potential disadvantages
- Costs of supporting schools and clinics
- Need to provide sufficient food, housing and water to a growing population, e.g. Kibera, Nairobi
- High rates of unemployment
- Large numbers of living in poor-quality housing, e.g. in shanty towns
- High rates of population growth
- High crime rates (strong neglect, unhappy family)
potential advantages and disadvantages of an ageing population:
potential advantages
- Elderly may have skills (including social skills) and training, and some employers especially supermarkets and home improvement/furniture stores, prefer them to younger workers
- Elderly may look after their grandchildren, allowing both parents to work (e.g. Japan and South Africa) “granny culture”
- In rich countries the elderly are often viewed as an important market - the “grey economy” - many firms, ranging from holiday companies to healthcare providers, have developed to target this market
potential disadvantages
- Older dependency ratio:
- Creates burdens on care givers, public pensions, and government budgets
- Increases taxes
- Increasing demand for health care and social services to meet the needs of the elderly, particularly where long-term care for degenerative ceases is concerned.
- Labour shortages and changes in employment patters, leading to issues relating to the introduction of more immigrant workers into the economy.
- Women living older and living alone (leads to loneliness)
- Internal migration as people move to new areas on retirement, often to rural or coastal locations.
case study of ageing population
Japan
(see document)
Economic and social costs and benefits of migration
Benefits and cost of international migration for individuals and countries
