An analysis of the fertility of Chinese women]

The 1982 census provided detailed information on fertility in China. It recorded 20,689,704 births in 1981, producing a birth rate of 2.1%, a decrease, respectively, of 43% and more than 50% in comparison with 1952 and 1963. The birth rate has varied widely over the last 30 years, from 3.6% in the early 1950's, to 1.8% in 1961, after a planned birth program was begun, to a record high of 3.7% in 1962 following the economic recovery, to 3.3% in 1970, after a gradual decline through the 1960's. By 1981 the birth rate had declined to 2.1%, clearly resulting from the intense planned fertility promotion begun in the early 1970's. In the mid- and late 50's, urban birth rate was consistently higher than rural, with the mass move to the cities at the beginning of the People's Republic. General economic development after 1957 brought simultaneous declines of both urban and rural rates, both reaching a low point in 1961. Age structure of the population also has an influence, depending on the proportion of childbearing women in the population. In 1981, the fertility of China's childbearing women was 8.3%, lower than that of the developing countries, but higher than the developed countries. By age group, the fertility rates reached 14.7% and 23.9% respectively in women between 20-24 and 25-29 years of age; the legal marriage age is 20. The fertility rate in large cities is generally lower than that of provinces. Higher educational and socio-economic level also exert an inverse influence on fertility rates; in low socio-economic areas the rate reached 3.5%, and in more advanced areas it was held to 2.2%. In all professions with the exception of agriculture, fishing, and forestry, the percentage of families with 1 child was 81.8%. Since planned fertility was implemented, the overall fertility rate has dropped from 3% to 2%. China's fertility mode has changed to that of developed countries, with high intensity between 20 and 29 years of age. Appropriate measures should be taken to lower the fertility rate in different regions.     

Recent fertility in Mexico: measurement and interpretation

Summary Mexican fertility has remained at a high level (a crude birth rate of 42-46) in spite of rapid economic development and its concomitants: rising levels of urbanization, education, income, and female labour force participation, and falling levels of infant mortality and agricultural population, combined with rural-urban migration. Data on child-woman ratios and children-ever-born statistics, for Mexico and each state, suggest that the constant crude birth rate is not masking age or region-specific declines in fertility. Cross-section regressions are employed in an attempt to explain Mexico's paradoxical fertility behaviour. Using measures of income, education, urbanization, occupational status, industrial composition, labour force participation, and the sex ratio, in a weighted log-linear form, a large portion of the variation in state adjusted child-woman ratios is explained by the 'demographic transition' variables. The only two which might possibly explain the trend in Mexican fertility are the income variable and the sex ratio, which have positive influences on Mexican fertility in 1960 and 1970.     

Differential fertility in Puerto Rico

In spite of high overall fertility Puerto Rico exhibits fertility differentials resembling those in areas where birth rates are low. The fertility of whites exceeds that of non-whites, educational standards influence child-bearing and there is a rural urban differential of long standing. These differences are documented in the paper and their implication for future population development in Puerto Rico is discussed     

Altitude, fertility and mortality in Andean countries

Abstract Using the census data for Peru, Bolivia and Ecuador, previous writers have investigated some possible determinants of inter-regional differences in fertility; language spoken, female participation rates, and altitude. This paper points out the many sources of inaccuracy in the census data used. It argues that the indicators of unusually low fertility in the highland, predominantly Indianspeaking areas fail to control effectively for the very high levels of infant mortality in these regions. Fragmentary survey results give some indication of the scale of infant mortality, and appear to refute the idea that fertility is exceptionally low in areas of high altitude. In an attempt to explain why such high mortality rates persist in the Andean region the main health problems of Bolivia are examined. It seems that the causes are economic and social, rather than physiological. Unfortunately a change of policy which reduced death rates would produce grave new social problems.     

Below-replacement fertility in east and southeast asia: Consequences and policy responses

Fourteen countries in Asia have total fertility rates at or below replacement level. This is more pronounced in China, Japan, the Republic of Korea, Singapore and Thailand. The implications are far-reaching and profound as they affect the age structure of the population, giving rise to population ageing, labour force shortages, increased elderly dependency ratios and feminization of the aged population. Evidence from European countries suggests that although fertility may rebound, in most countries it is highly unlikely that fertility will recover sufficiently to reach replacement level in the near future. Mortality reduction will continue to be an overriding policy goal, which would further enhance the ageing process. Therefore, the greatest challenge will be to pension systems, old-age care systems, and health systems or health insurance. This paper first examines the fertility transition in five low-fertility countries. It then discusses the policy measures that these countries have adopted in response to low fertility and population ageing. The paper concludes with the policy implications for healthcare, social care, income security and caregiving facility, and the scope for further study.     

The Decline of marital fertility in Japan

Summary Studies concerning the demographic history of Tokuwara and Meiji Japan suggest that fertility rose substantially before declining during the twentieth century. Were the motivations and circumstances which held down natality during the feudal period similar to those which account for the modern fertility decline and the low birth rate obtaining in the Japan of to-day? The thesis of this paper is that the pre-modern situation was fundamentally different from the modern one. During the Tokugawa era infanticide and abortion were used, independently of parity, to eliminate weak offspring whose chances of survival were deemed poor. Desired natality generally exceeded natural fertility. With the rise of income per head during the Meiji period the population's need for these desparate practices vanished. To-day parity-specific control characterizes fertility. Parityspecific control was diffused throughout Japan in response to declining desired fertility. Desired fertility fell significantly below natural fertility sometime during the late nineteenth or early twentieth century and the wish to reduce actual fertility to the desired level stimulated the adoption of parity-specific control. The speed of decline in marital fertility was partially governed by official policies toward contraception and abortion, contraception and abortion.     

The economic explanation of fertility changes in the United States

Abstract It is widely assumed that fertility varies positively with economic conditions. Actually this assumption receives little support from the historical record. For a century before 1930 fertility declined while the economy expanded and real incomes rose. Then for nearly three decades fertility and incomes fell and rose together. Since 1960 they have again moved in opposite directions. Clearly, no simple generalization about their relation will hold water. More sophisticated explanations are based on relative rather than absolute incomes. Banks suggested that the downturn in English fertility in the 1870's might have occurred because standards of middle-class consumption rose faster than middle-class incomes, but he found the evidence inconclusive. To reconcile the post-war baby boom in the United States with earlier experience, Easterlin has argued that fertility is determined by the relationship between the income of couples in their twenties and the income of their parents ten to fifteen years earlier. Among the weaknesses of this theory as applied to U.S. experience are its failure to explain the sharp drop in fertility, including that of native white urban women, in the 1920's; the fact that fertility rose most in the baby boom at the higher socio-economic levels where incomes rose least; and the sharp decline of fertility after 1962 in spite of the favourable trend of incomes, including those of younger people. The broad conclusion is that while couples no doubt do consider income, employment opportunities, etc. in deciding how many children to have, such considerations have had a relatively minor influence on changes in fertility, which for the most part have been the result of changes in attitudes. Even the post-war baby boom was a result not only of higher incomes and full employment but also of a shift in attitudes toward family size, particularly among the better-educated, economically better-off sections of society.     

Aboriginal fertility: Trends and prospects

Estimates of Aboriginal fertility compiled from an analysis of 1981 and 1986 Census data on children ever borne by Aboriginal women reveal age-specific fertility rates slightly higher than those of other Australian women at ages above 25, but very much higher rates for younger women. The result is a total fertility ratio more than 50 per cent higher than in the total Australian population, with no more than slight variation between States and Territories. A differential analysis using standardized indices shows considerable differences in levels of fertility of categories of young Aboriginal women classified by education, labour force status and income, and also differences between urban and rural areas. Analysis of prospects for Aboriginal fertility levels confirms the likelihood of continuation in the downward drift in levels of fertility that has been established during the past decade. Comparison of the estimates with another recent set of estimates obtained using the own-children method shows broad conformity in levels of total fertility ratios over time, except in the most recent period, the mid-1980s. Nevertheless, the own-children estimates distort the recent trend and also the age distribution of Aboriginal fertility.     

Developing strategies for deriving small population fertility rates

Many agencies require population estimates and projections by ethnic group. These projections need ethnic-specific, age-specific fertility rates (ASFRs) but their inclusion is challenging since ethnicity is not recorded at birth registration. In this paper maternity data are used in a case study of electoral wards in Bradford, West Yorkshire, to develop fertility rates for small populations for a 1991 based projection. The challenge is to capture local variations in fertility by ethnic group when data are sparse. Small areas were grouped together using cluster analysis to define combinations with similar sociodemographic and fertility experiences so that sparse data could be aggregated to estimate reliable ethnic-specific fertility rates. For comparison, the data were aggregated into the 1991 Office for National Statistics area type classification. Fertility rates by single year of age for all area types were smoothed using the Hadwiger function. For the White ethnic group there were sufficient births to create ethnic-specific, ward-level ASFRs. For other ethnicities grouping of areas was necessary. The accuracy of the ASFRs in predicting births was assessed using mean absolute percentage error. Results show that for some minority groups district-level ethnic-specific fertility rates produced the most accurate birth estimates even though they were based on a larger area. This implies that rates created may be informative about the local area for White ethnic type but not in the same way for smaller ethnic groups. In terms of grouping strategies we recommend that existing classifications are assessed to determine how well variations in rates are stratified before embarking on a custom scheme. Where population sub-groups are small in some areas, it may be more reliable to use rates derived for larger areas and apply these to local populations. Inevitably, the rates used in a projection are a compromise but hopefully will still capture important dimensions of population change.     

Bulletin of major figures from manual tabulation of the national sample survey on fertility and birth control of China

The State Council, the State Family Planning Commission, the State Statistical Bureau, the State Planning Commission, the Ministry of Finance, and the Ministry of Public Security of China together carried out a national sample survey on fertility and birth control in China in 1988. The survey was carried out in 30 provinces, autonomous regions, and municipalities directly under the Central Government. The Tibetan Autonomous Region and the Hainan Province were surveyed for the 1st time, but the results from Tibet were not collected in time for this publication. The main respondents were the married women at age 15-57, with 2,114,591 people surveyed and a sampling proportion of 1.98/1000. This article describes the survey and its results according to birth rate, parity composition, and rural-urban fertility differences. Birth rates, mortality rates, and natural increase rates from high to low orders were tabulated for: urban areas, farms, towns, rural townships, and suburban townships. With the first 1/2 of 1988 birth rates tabulated, it was estimated that the total number of births in China will be less than in 1987. In 1987, the rate of 3rd or higher parity birth was below 5% in 6 provinces and municipalities, but 10 provinces and autonomous regions were over 20%. Fertility rates showed considerable disparity depending on the locational demographics (e.g. birth rates in urban areas were 14.3/1000 yet birth rates were 24.3/1000 in suburban townships).     

The effects of income level,income distribution,education and urbanization on fertility rates among 28 administrative regions of China

Conflicting empirical evidence on the role of income distribution on fertility rates is the impetus for this 1982 study of providence-specific Chinese Census data, excluding Tibet. The findings support the prior thesis of Repetto but utilize the micromethods and per household income measures of the competing findings of Boulier. It is cautioned that in the Chinese analysis equal income distribution depresses fertility, but China may not reflect world wide patterns. China did not have until recently a market incentive system, and there are income measurement problems. The data are per capita economic output not per capita income, and those high output areas which did not produce low fertility may actually have had households with low incomes. The importance of this research is in establishing that cross-province data are a useful tool in understanding the influence of income distribution on fertility. As with most developing countries, women's education, for instance, at least junior high education explained the largest variation of fertility differences among the 28 provinces. The urbanization variable when controlling for income was positive, unlike the other developing countries. The 1949 Chinese government's spatial industrial policy encouraged urbanization and industrialization in rural areas and family planning programs such that highly urbanized provinces have low population density. A variety of variables on income level, income distribution, education, and urbanization are discussed. OLSQ regressions were generated utilizing such independent variables as output per capita in yuan (YOUTHPC80), the square of YOUTHPC80 (YOUTHPC802), YOUTHPC80 multiplied by the average family size in each province (YOUTHPH80), and the squared value of YOUTHPH80.     

Ethnic variations in the relationship between income and fertility

The effects of husband'spotential andrelative incomes on completed fertility, as well as their effects on certain parity progression probabilities, are examined within samples of Anglos, Blacks and Mexican Americans. Relationships are estimated using data from the one-percent 1960 and 1970 U.S. Public Use Samples. The results reveal different patterns of relationship by ethnicity between the measures of income and the measures of fertility. The effects on completed fertility of the income measures are positive for Anglos and negative for Blacks, while in the case of Mexican Americans the effect ofpotential income is negative and that ofrelative income is positive. Income effects on the parity progression probabilities are similar in pattern to those from the analyses using completed fertility, although somewhat different patterns tend to appear at different birth orders, especially among Anglos.     

Trends in fertility level in the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics during the years of Soviet rule

The birth rates of the USSR within its present boundaries are reconstructed for the period 1918-1940 on the basis of incomplete data and taking into consideration several changes in frontiers. Estimates for the years 1941-1945 are derived from data on school attendance during the 1949-1954 period, as well as from data provided by the censuses of 1959 and 1970 concerning cohort survival. Deriving an "effective fertility rate," which adjusts for the mortality wastage of young children, discussion focus is on fertility trends until 1976 and the changes in age patterns of reproduction at the national level and in the various republics. During the 1918-1940 period, the birth rate in the USSR never fell below 30/1000 and never exceeded 45/1000. There was a significant drop in the birth rate in the 1931-1936 period, and this is attributable to the problems of the period of collectivization and to the large-scale processes of migration involved in the country's industrialization. After the late 1940s, the overall birth rate in the USSR stabilized at a level of 25-27/1000, but from 1960 onwards, there was a steady decline in the rate. The level reached its lowest in 1969 and then rose somewhat. This increase reflects the transient influence of changes in the age-marriage structure of the population and in the "timetable" of births. A comparison of the present fertility level with the level in the 1920s indicates that the birth rate has declined by a factor of approximately 2.5, but in evaluating this decline the sharp decline in mortality, particularly infant mortality, must also be considered. The child mortality level in prerevolutionary Russia was very high. The overall mortality rate for the 20 provinces of European Russia in 1920-1922 was 33.2/1000, namely, 1/4 higher than it was before the Revolution. In subsequent years infant mortality continued at a high level and was 18.2% in 1940. In the last 25 years mortality in children under age 5 has markedly declined. In 1976 the overall birth rate was 18.5/1000 and the "effective" birth rate was 18.0/1000. The practice of birth control in families is spreading in various ways. In some cases the proportion of married couples using family planning is increasing, while in other cases couples already using birth control are beginning to use it after the birth of a child lower in birth order. In most areas of the country birth control is being practiced predominantly in such a way as to keep families down to 1 or 2 children. For the whole of the USSR in 1973-1974, the gross reproduction rate was 1.178, while the net rate was 1.118. Although there is ample population replacement in the country as a whole, in a number of republics even mere replacement is threatened.     

A new method for estimating the level of natural fertility in populations practicing birth control

The natural fertility schedule of a population is the schedule of age-specific marital fertility we would observe if no birth control were being practiced. In natural fertility (no birth control) populations we can observe the natural fertility schedule directly, but in populations practicing birth control the natural fertility schedule is disguised by the marital fertility rates in those age intervals in which control is exercised, the marital fertility rates being below the natural rates. This paper elaborates a method for estimating the natural fertility schedules of populations practicing birth control. Two alternative models are presented, one nonlinear and one linear. The use of these models is then illustrated with reference to the Old Order Amish population of Lancaster County, Pennsylvania. It is shown that for Amish women born between 1860 and 1900 both the nonlinear and linear models yield an estimate of .843 as the ratio between Amish and Hutterite natural fertility schedules.     

生育文明与我国未来生育率控制

我国的生育率变化一直以来都与生育文明的发展有着密切的关系。深厚的传统生育文化支持着我国农业社会的高生育水平,这在历史上起到过一定的积极作用,但是庞大的人口数量越来越成为我国经济社会发展的包袱。我国现阶段生育率已经在计划生育政策的控制下,达到了一个较低的标准。但是,这种低生育水平还很不稳定,也不可避免的带来了一些社会问题。随着我国经济发展和社会转型,推进生育文明的发展将成为稳定低生育水平,实现适度人口规模的最好方法。     

Recent changes in Negro fertility

Crude birth rates for the Negro population of the United States indicate that fertility declined while Negroes remained in the South and them climbed in the last twenty-five years as Negroes became urbanized. Cohort rates show more precisely the effects of the Depression upon childbearing as well as the magnitude and persistence of the post-Depression rise in fertility. More Negro women now become mothers, average family size has increased, and the proportion of women bearing six, seven, or eight children has risen. Negro fertility has risen despite the urbanization of Negroes and improvements in their socio-economic characteristics. Negro fertility rates present the paradox of falling when demographic transition theory would predict the maintenance of high rates and then rising when a decline would be expected. Urbanization does not appear to have reduced Negro fertility. Traditionally, urban living has dampened childbearing in two ways—first, health conditions in cities were inferior to those of rural areas, and thus urbanization affected fecundity adversely; second, city residents are more likely to know about and adopt birth control than rural residents. Negroes migrated to cities at the very time when diseases were being controlled and when public health and welfare facilities were being expanded to serve all residents. This has contributed to higher Negro fertility rates. If fertility rates are to fall because of family planning, not only must birth control be available but there must be a desire to limit family size. Such a desire may be linked to opportunities for social mobility. Negroes have not been assimilated into urban society as previous in-migrant groups were, and opportunities for mobility have been restricted. For these reasons Negroes may be slow to adopt stable monogamous families and the intentional control of fertility.     

Interregional differences in fertility in Brazil, 1950–1970

Trends and interregional differences in the birth rate in Brazil between 1950 and 1970 are examined. Estimates are based on data from the 1950 and 1970 censuses. Regional differences in birth measures (crude and general rates) were found to widen between 1950 and 1970 despite a decline in fertility at the national level and a narrowing of regional differences in important socioeconomicvariables like income and urbanization, The substantial interregional migration flows which occurred in Brazil between 1950 and 1970 are examined for their possible impact on differentials. The effects are mixed, but the conclusion is that migration contributed to widening differences.     

Below-replacement fertility and prospects for labour force growth in Taiwan

Fertility in Taiwan had declined to replacement level in 1983. In 1986–1997, the total fertility rate dropped to 1.7–1.8, with continuing decreases observed in 1997–2001. Fertility will probably be sustained at the 2001 level of 1.48 or even decline further in the future. If the current fertility and labour-force participation rates persist, the size of the labour force will increase only slightly in the next 15 years and begin to shrink soon after 2015. After 2034, the labour force will fall below the current level and Taiwan will face a labour shortage. Though efficient, the policy option of importing more foreign workers is fraught with political sensitivities, especially given the current economic downturn and rising unemployment. Another policy approach, to increase the participation rates for women and mature men, would lead to growth in the labour supply sometime after 2030 and, combined with a modest increase in fertility, would prevent the labour force from falling below its current size in the next 50 years. Notwithstanding that any increase in fertility will have a delayed effect on labour supply, strong incentives are still required to affect fertility behaviour.