Demography

• birth rate


  the number of live births per thousand of population per year.
• Total Fertility Rate (TFR)


  The average number of children a woman will have throughout her fertile years.
• Reasons for the decline in birth rate

  - changes in women's position

  - decline in the infant mortality rate

  - children are now an economic liability

  - child centredness
• Effects of changes in fertility


  1) family - smaller families

  2) the dependency ratio - short term = reduced burden long term = increased burden

  3) public services and policies
• Reasons for the decline in death rate

  -Improved nutrition

  -Medical improvements

  -Smoking and diet

  -Public health measures

  -Other social changes
• Class, gender and regional differences in life expectancy

  women live longer

  south live longer

  richer areas live longer
• Effects of ageing population

  -Public services

  -One-person pensioner households

  -The dependency ratio
• Old age in modern society

  Life is structured into fixed age stages - and age related identities.

  Status is determined by our role in production - those excluded from production have a dependent status

  'structured dependency
• Old age in postmodern society

  Fixed stages of life broken down- individuals have a choice of lifestyle - whatever their age.

  Status is determined by consumption rather than production
• policy implications of the ageing population

  Donald Hirsch - the main problem is how to finance longer periods of old age dependency - saving more from our savings, taxes and working longer.

  Encouraging old people to trade down into smaller homes

  change in social attitudes towards old age
• Immigration


  refers to movement into a society
• Emmigration


  refers to movement out of a society
• Net migration

  The difference between the level of immigration and the level of emigration. Expressed as a net increase or net decrease.
• push factors


  Factors that induce people to leave old residences.

  e.g. economic recession or unemployment at home
• pull factors


  Factors that induce people to move to a new location.

  e.g. higher wages or better opportunity or health care abroad
• Impact of migration on UK population structure

  growing population size as net migration is high and births to non-UK born mothers are high, accounting for about 25% of all births

  Age structure - immigrants are generally younger, also more fertile

  Dependency ratio - immigrants are more likely to be of working age and often retire in their country of origin
• globalisation


  the idea that barriers between societies are disappearing and people are becoming increasingly interconnected across national boundaries.
• Trends of globalisation on migration

  -acceleration of immigration

  -differentiation ( many types of immigrants - super diversity)

  -feminisation of migration (Ehrenreich and Hochschild observe that care work, domestic work and sex services in western cultures are often done by women in poorer countries)

  -migrant identities (hybrid and hierarchal identities)

  -transnational identities (belonging to multiple cultures)
• Robin Cohen's types of migrants


  Citizens - Full citizenship rights

  Denizen - Privileged foreign nationals welcomed by the state

  Helots - Exploited groups. They are usually trafficked in and are legally tied to their employers such as domestic slaves
• assimilation


  Encouraging immigrants to adopt the language, values, and customs of the host culture
• Multiculturalism


  accepts the migrants may wish to retain their separate culture of identity
• Eriksen deep diversity


  such as arranged marriages or veiling being accepted
• Eriksen shallow diversity


  such as regarding chicken tikka masala as a British national dish