Tax reform, population ageing and the changing labour supply behaviour of married women

"The burden of financing retirement incomes in an ageing population is predicted to rise sharply in future decades. This paper investigates the effects of reforms to the Australian tax-benefit system involving a greater reliance on proportional taxation for raising revenue and a more targeted welfare system for cutting government expenditure, in order to reduce expected budget deficits. Estimates of changes in net incomes and hours of work suggest that reforms of this kind shift the tax burden to lower and middle income households with a second earner and that they can have counter-productive labour supply effects. The study explores the impact of projected increases in female work force participation and illustrates the importance of shifts in the labour supply of married women in predicting the fiscal effects of demographic change."

Using census data for household projections: an overview of results from the HOMES Project

"This article provides an overview of the household projection model HOMES [a computer model developed to forecast the number and characteristics of households] and presents new household projections for six countries--China, Indonesia, Japan, the Republic of Korea, Thailand, and the Philippines. The household projections are based on recently released population projections from The World Bank and on rules governing living arrangements quantified with the latest available census or demographic survey for each country. Growth in the number of households to the year 2030 is projected along with changes in household membership and the dependency burden."

Why do Chinese women practice contraception? The case of rural Jilin Province

This study focuses on the relationship between contraceptive behavior, family size preferences, and perceptions of the one-child policy among young Chinese women in rural areas of Jilin Province. In 1985, about 85 percent of rural married women with one surviving child were practicing contraception, although most of them reported two as their ideal number of children. Most women with one surviving child, including those with one-child certificates, were practicing contraception in response to the government campaign, while more than half of women with two or more children were doing so voluntarily. Most of the women with one child were using the IUD, whereas more than half of women with two or more children were sterilized. Through multivariate analysis of contraceptive behavior and method choice, additional factors were found to be associated with the contraceptive behavior of rural Jilin women; achievement of their ideal family size was a significant factor in the voluntary practice of contraception as well as in contraceptive method choice. Implications of the results are discussed.

Family planning knowledge, attitudes, and practices of men in Zimbabwe

The purpose of this report is to describe knowledge, attitudes, and practices in family planning among male Zimbabweans. Understanding the role of men in inhibiting or promoting contraceptive adoption could affect the design of family planning promotion programs and program success in Zimbabwe and other African countries. Data from the 1988 Male Fertility Survey, a representative sample of 711 currently married men aged 20 and over, showed that men have a major role in the decision to use family planning methods and in determining the number of children a couple should have. Male knowledge of various family planning methods was high, as was approval and ever-use of family planning. Attitudes toward family planning information, obtaining methods, couple communication, and family size were also investigated. It was concluded that men should be included in information, education, and communication programs, without delay. Program efforts should move beyond emphasis on child spacing to stress family size limitation in order to increase contraceptive prevalence, resulting in a commensurate decline in the level of fertility.

Young women's work and family formation in Sri Lanka

"Patterns of family formation in Sri Lanka resemble those of wealthier nations, with late marriage, delayed childbearing, and moderately low fertility. This article addresses two questions: How have these family formation patterns emerged in the absence of the normally expected levels of economic development? And what activities have occupied young women in the premarital, prechildbearing period? Answers are suggested by data from three sources: the 1981 census; a set of focus-group discussions on the rights, obligations, and aspirations of young women related to marriage, work, childbearing, and child care; and a sample survey of 1,535 women of ages 15-30 in Kalutara District. The article describes the interplay of socioeconomic and familial forces that have affected the status of young Sri Lankan women."

Birth order effects and time allocation

"In this paper, a model is developed in which the explanation for birth-order effects does not rely on absence of capital markets, but follows from optimal allocation of parental time and goods among children over the childrearing years. The model yields two key results, which are then tested using 1967-1968 household survey data from urban Colombia.... It is shown that first and last-born children of mothers who do not work have an advantage over middle-borns.... At the same time, as predicted, there are no differences by birth order among children of working mothers. The persistence of birth-order effects even in high-income families indicates that such effects are at least in part due to the time constraint modelled; this is a strong result given the possibility of better substitutes for mother's time than allowed for in the model, and the likelihood that high-income families are able to purchase better substitutes."

Pay-as-you-go social security in a changing environment

"In this paper, we examine the optimal pay-as-you-go social security scheme which reallocates resources across generations in a changing environment, that is, with fluctuations in population growth rates and in productivity levels. We use an overlapping generations model along with a social welfare function consisting of the sum of generational utilities either unweighted or weighted by population size and a discount factor. We show how intergenerational resource sharing can be used to improve social welfare even though the extent of intergenerational redistribution is hampered by payroll tax deadweight losses...." The authors also consider the effects of an economy's openness on resource sharing. The geographical focus is on developed countries.

Relationship of perceived maternal acceptance-rejection in childhood and social support networks of pregnant adolescents

In a sample of 53 at-risk pregnant adolescents, the relationship between their perceptions of maternal acceptance-rejection in childhood and the nature of their social supports was examined. Perception of acceptance-rejection was significantly correlated with both frequency of interaction with social network members and expectations of their future support. Implications for public health strategies are discussed.

Rice-ORS shortens the duration of watery diarrhoeas. Observation from rural Bangladesh

In rural Bangladesh, standard glucose based oral rehydration salt (glucose-ORS) and rice based oral rehydration salt (rice-ORS) were compared as domiciliary treatment for watery diarrhoea. Using identical supply systems, packaged glucose-ORS was provided in one area and packets of rice-ORS in another. Mothers of under-five children in each area were trained in the preparation and use of the respective ORS. A third area, where no ORS was provided from the study source, served as comparison. In two years of surveillance and follow-up about 10,000 diarrhoeal episodes were detected in each area, approximately one-third of which were watery diarrhoea. Rice-ORS alone was used to treat 74% of these episodes and glucose-ORS alone for 65% of the episodes in the respective areas. Drugs were the main treatment regimen used in the comparison area. Results of the study showed that rice-ORS treated episodes of watery diarrhoea ended with shorter duration (median duration 2 days vs. 4 days) and fewer hospitalisation (0.1% vs. 0.5%) compared to those treated with glucose-ORS. These differences were statistically significant. But, diarrhoeal mortality was unaffected by the use of either ORS under the study situation.

Intra-family bargaining and time allocation

"This paper investigates a new empirical implication of the cooperative bargaining model of family decision-making: the effect of threat point variations on time allocation decisions of the husband and wife....The bargaining model examined in this paper utilizes the cooperative game theory approach which assumes, among other things, that both players (spouses) know each other's utility function. With many family decisions such as marital dissolution, timing and spacing of children, labor market entry or reentry for the wife, it is not necessarily true that the preferences of each spouse are accurately known by the other.... In the context of the two-period model sketched out in this paper, bargaining between husband and wife over the extent of human capital investment for the wife, and the time allocation tradeoffs necessary to attain such an investment might be fruitfully modelled in a noncooperative framework." Data are from a variety of sources, including a University of Michigan study of couples' time-allocation patterns in 37 U.S. states and the District of Columbia.

Immigrant fertility patterns in Canada, 1961-1986

"This paper has examined the fertility of immigrants who arrived in Canada at various periods in the recent past. Cumulative and current fertility measures derived from 1961, 1971, 1981 and 1986 censuses have indicated that immigrants tend to have children at a lower rate during the periods when they are immigrating, but at a higher rate after immigrating. However, once they have resided in the host country for a certain length of time, their fertility may either converge with that of the native-born population or may become even lower." (SUMMARY IN FRE AND SPA)

Demographic factors reshaping ties to family and place

This article explores the broad topic of how the selective character of human migration and changing family circumstances may shape the intensity of local need among the future elderly. At origin, it is the healthier, better educated, and more affluent elderly who venture to migrate; and although people migrate from a broad spectrum of origins, they flow selectively to a narrow spectrum of destinations. At the same time, contemporary changes in family makeup and internal division of labor alter their capacity to care for elderly members. These demographic realities define a policy issue ripe for study. 1990 census data can reveal how the pressures of population aging will diffuse spatially, in terms of timing and intensity and, given the complex interaction of migration selectivity and family transformation, who will be distanced from whom, and with what consequences. Scattered evidence from earlier years casts light on certain facets of this issue: (a) the ties between elderly and their children, (b) the differing configurations of migration flows generating elderly concentration in locales, and (c) the changing nature of elderly concentration in recent decades. With 1990 census data, it will be possible to extend certain findings and consider their implications for how future aging and dependency may express themselves locally.