Predictors of satisfaction with environmental quality in eight European countries

This paper reports comparative social indicator data from eight member countries of the European Economic Community (EEC): Germany, France, Italy, the United Kingdom, Belgium, Denmark, Ireland and the Netherlands. Nationwide representative samples in each country were interviewed in 1977 in the context of a harmonized study of subjective social indicators. A major purpose of the study was to examine the cross-cultural generalizability of the influence of objective and subjective characteristics in predicting three measures of environmental quality: (1) Satisfaction with Housing, (2) Satisfaction with Neighbourhood, and (3) Satisfaction with Health Services, as well as in predicting the global measure of Life Satisfaction. Stepwise multiple regression analyses were performed on each of the four dependent variables for each of the eight countries. The cross-national comparability of predictors was examined and similarities and differences were discussed.     

The prediction of perceived well-being

Regression analysis of data from a sample of Northwestern Wisconsin residents shows that a limited number of domain satisfactions accounts for a significant proportion of the variance in life satisfaction. Most life satisfaction is derived from domains which are personal, broader in scope, and central to the individual, and which gain ascendency in the social and psychological life space of the individual as a result of differences in sex, age and income. Satisfaction with health, family and even community override work satisfaction as the main source of men's life satisfaction, while satisfaction with family life easily overwhelms other domain satisfactions as predictors of the life satisfaction of women. Also, the effect of family satisfaction is much stronger for women than men, and during the socially and biologically most productive years of life than in maturity. The contribution of satisfaction with sparetime activities, family, work, etc. to the life satisfaction of the elderly is consistent with a theory of re-engagement in fewer but more meaningful roles. Income differences do not sharply discriminate among the predictors, except at the extremes. Overall, the study demonstrates the efficacy of domain satisfaction measures as predictors of life satisfaction.     

Poverty dynamics in eight countries

Despite very different macroeconomic conditions, demographic structures and degrees of income inequality, favorable income changes among low-income families with children were widespread and strikingly similar across the eight countries in our study. In most European countries, the combination of modest inequality and extensive mobility among the poor enabled virtually all families to avoid relative income deprivation at least occasionally. However, even substantial mobility among the poor in the Unites States could not elevate the living standards of one in seven white and two in five black families to a level that was half that enjoyed by a typical American family.This paper is the result of a collaborative research project sponsored by the Rockefeller Foundation, the Russell Sage Foundation and the European Science Foundation as part of its Network on Household Panel Studies. CEPS/INSTEAD provided substantial in-kind support. Deborah Laren provided excellent research assistance. Jos Berghman, Tim Callan, Bengt-Olof Gert, Peter Gottschalk, Pierre Hausman, Bruno Jeandidier, Kjell Janssen, Stephen Jenkins, Anders Klevmarken, Katherine McFate, Udo Neumann, Willard Rodgers, Gaston Schaber, Tim Smeeding, Daniel Stripinis, Hedwig Vermeulen, Wolfgang Voges and Brendan Whelan provided substantial assistance and advice during the course of the project. An earlier version of the paper was presented at the conference Poverty and Public Policy in Paris in January, 1991. The paper was edited by Timothy M. Smeeding, Syracuse University, using two anonymous referees.     

Contraceptive determinants in three leading countries

The purpose of this paper is to examine the relative importance of access to family planning and the motivation to restrict fertility in determining contraceptive use in three countries that have led the fertility transitions in their regions: Colombia, Tunisia, and Zimbabwe. A structural equations model is estimated where endogenous fertility intentions are allowed to affect contraceptive method use. Simulation methods are then used to quantify the size of the impact of intentions and access on method choice for the three countries. The results demonstrate that even after controlling for fertility intentions, family planning program variables still have important effects in all three countries.     

Demographic transition in Arab countries: A new perspective

This paper provides a new perspective on the fertility transition in Arab countries. It shows that the story of Arab fertility must be retold: the story is of a region with the highest fertility preferences, exhibiting reluctance to change due to the stranglehold of cultural forces, and just starting to respond to development forces. The paper shows that Arab regional experience is quite comparable to that of other developing countries and that, though the fertility decline occurred at a somewhat later date, the pace of decline more than compensates for this delay. Furthermore, the probing of country level experiences and forces underlying the transition shows the diversities of these experiences and the exaggeration of the role of cultural specificity. It also demonstrates that a large part of the decline in Arab fertility is due to changes in nuptiality. For some segments of society and some countries, these changes are not paralleled by increased opportunities for women to have more fulfilling lives. For these women, the fertility decline is not necessarily improving the quality of their lives and cannot be equated with progress and development.     

Demographic determinants of labour market in Poland in 1990-2000

The author examines factors affecting Poland's transition to a market economy, including changes in the age, sex, and spatial distribution of the labor force. Educational status is also considered. The analysis concerns the period 1975-2000, with emphasis on the years from 1988 to 1990.     

Demographic data collection in less developed countries 1946-1996

This evolution over the last 50 years of data collection systems in less developed countries is assessed. The progress made by civil registration systems has been extremely disappointing. Except in Central and South America, their role in providing vital rate estimates is still very limited. In contrast, the promulgation of regular population censuses has been a success, particularly in Africa. The relative merits and demerits of different types of demographic surveys are described. To some extent multi-round designs have given way to single-round surveys, such as the Demographic and Health Surveys (DHS). DHS-style enquiries are particularly suitable for evaluation of interventions but are less appropriate if the main aim is to measure vital rates.     

Spare time use and perceived well-being among black South African youth

Leisure opportunities for urban black South Africans are limited but there is little evidence which documents the experience of disadvantage or its significance for retarded advancement and depressed quality of life. An exploratory questionnaire study, conducted in 1989 in three metropolitan areas among black township youth (age 15–25 years, predominantly Zulu-and Xhosa-speakers) of both sexes, inquired into spare time habits and activities, participation rates, leisure aspirations, satisfactions, preferences, and barriers. Each subject also kept activity diaries for a specific weekday and a weekend day. Preliminary results from the time budget data are discussed with reference to subjects' overall life satisfaction and outlook on the future. Findings have policy implications for reducing inequalities in a socially divided society.The University of Natal rejects apartheid. It is an equal opportunities, affirmative action University.     

Pronatalist population policies in some Western European countries

This article is restricted to a comparison of four Western European countries: France, the Federal Republic of Germany, the Netherlands and the United Kingdom. As the crude birthrates and total period fertility rates of these countries indicate, a stabilization of fertility has set in in France, the Netherlands and the United Kingdom. Official government attitudes towards these developments differ greatly, with France having clear pronatalist policy measures, the German Federal Government having only family policy measures, but some member states going further with a policy of family foundation loans. In the Netherlands and the United Kingdom, no official population policy exists, apart from a certain reluctance to accept more foreign immigrants. It must be concluded that the only common characteristic of population policies in the four countries is that they try to enable women to work and care for a family at the same time. The future effect of pronatalist population policy measures is still highly in doubt.This article was originally presented as a paper to the Annual Meeting of the Population Association of America, Washington DC, March 28, 1981.     

Demographic characteristics,work complexity and economic setting as social status determinants

Various aspects of social standing are significantly, though differently, determined by demographic characteristics, by employment in different economic sectors and industries, and by work complexity. Various sectors and industries influence differently status achievement, and are characterized by different configurations of status determinants of their workforces. The public (government) sector is more meritocratic than the private one, as far as income is concerned. Also, the male achievement pattern seems to be more meritocratic, while the female pattern is more sensitive to transient influences. The indicators of socio-economic status, occupational prestige and income reflect separate dimensions of social standing. The indicators of work complexity with data, people and things are good predictors of individual's social position.     

Attitudes toward family size in some East European countries

Summary The paper is a review of published materials on attitudes toward family size derived from nationwide family planning studies conducted in Czechoslovakia, Hungary, Poland and the USSR around 1970. Priority is given to the findings on expected family size, though other attitudinal variables such as the ideal number of children and/or the number planned at marriage are also discussed. The paper shows that the majority of women in all the countries surveyed tend to have a limited number of children. Although the trend is especially striking among better-educated and gainfully employed women, it is also spreading fast, particularly among the younger generations, through the whole urban and rural population. The average expected family size is generally close to, and for a sizeable group of women below, replacement level. The trend toward a small family size is only partially a reflection of real desires. Various factors, most of them apparently of an economic nature, prompt many women to have fewer children than they would wish. If the average expected fertility were equal to that considered as ideal or to that planned at marriage there would be no danger that births would fall below replacement level. In contrast to the situation in the countries as a whole, women in the Asian Republics of the USSR not only expect but also tend to regard as ideal a family with larger numbers of children.     

“欧洲第二次人口转变”理论及其思考

人口转变始于欧洲 ,人口转变理论的提出是基于对欧洲人口转变历史的研究。近年欧洲人口转变出现新的形式和特点 ,并发展出“欧洲第二次人口转变”理论。国内学者对我国人口转变问题的讨论中 ,却几乎还没有触及这一新情况和新理论。本文总结“第二次人口转变”理论的主要观点 ,对比第二次人口转变和第一次人口转变的特征 ,分析其转变的内在动因 ,及其未来的走向 ,并提出对世界和中国未来家庭及人口发展的思考。     

Demographic change and response: Social context and the practice of birth control in six countries

This paper expands on Kingsley Davis’s demographic thesis of change and response. Specifically, we consider the social context that accounts for the primacy of particular birth control methods that bring about fertility change during specific time periods. We examine the relevance of state policy (including national family planning programs), the international population establishment, the medical profession, organized religion, and women’s groups using case studies from Japan, Russia, Puerto Rico, China, India, and Cameroon. Some of these countries are undergoing the second demographic transition, others the first. Despite variations in context, heavy reliance on sterilization and/or, abortion as a means of birth control is a major response in most of these countries. The key roles of the medical profession and state policy are discussed, along with the general lack of influence of religion and of women’s groups in these countries.     

Demographic change,rising earnings inequality,and the distribution of personal well-being, 1959–1989

This paper uses new methods to determine the sources of the sharp fall and then the steep rise in personal income inequality between 1959 and 1989. The increase in the proportion of single-head families tended to boost inequality over the entire period. Forty percent of the reduction in income inequality in the 1960s occurred because of the decline in earnings inequality among male heads of families; more than one-third of the increase in inequality after 1969 occurred because inequality in male earnings soared. Since 1979 females’ gains in earnings have increased inequality because these gains have been concentrated increasingly in families with high incomes     

Individual and institutional determinants of multidimensional poverty: A European comparison

In this article we evaluate to what extent between-country differences in the probability of being ‘multidimensional’ poor can be explained by a range of ‘domain-specific’ indicators of welfare regime arrangements. To this end, a so-called micro-macro model is estimated, testing the ‘independent’ effect of institutions, as opposed to alternative explanations such as between-country differences in population composition and economic affluence. Although we conclude that institutional arrangements do influence the risk of multidimensional poverty in the expected direction, we also find that bringing the ‘economy’ back into the analyses has a non-trivial impact. Our results point at several avenues for further discussion and research. First, although the more elaborate welfare regimes generally do a better job in preventing poverty, the level of transfers is not always ‘proportional’ to the general standard of living in these countries. Second, we only find partial confirmation for the often cited ‘negative’ impact of labour market flexibility and the related equality-jobs trade-off. While stricter employment regulations do reduce the poverty risk (be it only after controlling for economic affluence), flexibility in terms of the availability of fixed-term labour seems to be preferable to unemployment, even if at the individual level, labour market flexibility increases the likelihood of being poor quite severely.

European Demographic Forecasts Have Not Become More Accurate Over the Past 25 Years

Nowadays, demographers, population statisticians, and population forecasters have richer data, more refined theories of demographic behavior, and more sophisticated methods of analysis than they had two or three decades ago. This scientific progress should have made it easier to predict demographic behavior. But analyses of the errors in older forecasts show that demographic forecasts published by statistical agencies in 14 European countries have not become more accurate over the past 25 years. The findings demonstrate that scientific progress in population studies during the previous two to three decades has not kept up with the trend toward less predictable demographic behavior of populations in European countries. There is no reason to be more optimistic about US Census Bureau forecasts. Population forecasts are intrinsically uncertain, hence should be couched in probabilistic terms.     

Projecting Long-Term Care Expenditure in Four European Union Member States: The Influence of Demographic Scenarios

This study examines the sensitivity of future long-term care demand and expenditure estimates to official demographic projections in four selected European countries: Germany, Spain, Italy and the United Kingdom. It uses standardised methodology in the form of a macro-simulation exercise and finds evidence for significant differences in assumptions about demographic change and its effect on the demand for long-term care, and on relative and absolute long-term care expenditure. It concludes that mortality-rate assumptions can have a considerable influence on welfare policy planning. Relative dispersion between country-specific and Eurostat official estimates was found to be higher for the United Kingdom and Germany than for Italy and Spain, suggesting that demographic projections had a greater influence in those countries.