Mothers’ dilemma at retirement across welfare regimes
Ester Rizzi and Younga Kim examine retirement intentions of 50-64 year-old mothers in Europe by family and employment trajectories. They find that experiencing work interruptions, having a higher number of … Read more
Unintended and sooner-than-intended childbearing in Eastern and Western Europe
Examining two waves of a panel survey, Zuzanna Brzozowska, Isabella Buber-Ennser and Bernhard Riederer find evidence that women and men in post-socialist countries more often have a child they planned … Read more
Clash of the Titans: NDC vs IPAYG (pay-as-you-go pension systems)
NDC (notional defined contribution) schemes are commonly believed to be the best kind of pay-as-you-go (PAYG) pension systems: actuarial equity and individual flexibility in accessing retirement are their main strengths. … Read more
Global trends in child loss: less and later
Child loss continues to be a common life event for women in the Global South. Diego Alburez-Gutierrez documents a historic opportunity to close the gap between the South and the … Read more
Educating children in India may help keep their parents healthy
A strong positive association exists between children’s education and parental health in India. Berenike Thoma and Jan-Walter De Neve explain that this positive relationship persists when controlling for a wide … Read more
Rent liberalization decreased age at marriage in Egypt
Young people’s ability to marry increasingly depends on obtaining housing and forming independent households. Ragui Assaad, Caroline Krafft, and Dominique J. Rolando show how Egypt’s 1996 rent liberalization law reversed … Read more
Late mothers and late fathers have a first birth with younger partners
Individual characteristics of late parents have been extensively studied in demographic literature, but less is known about the parental couple. As Marie-Caroline Compans shows, looking at fathers and mothers separately, … Read more
Gendered health burdens and benefits of starting and ending caregiving
What happens to caregivers’ health when they stop caregiving? Damiano Uccheddu, Tom Emery, Nardi Steverink, and Anne H. Gauthier investigate the matter across 17 European countries with an innovative method … Read more
Minor contribution of migration to urbanization in low- and middle-income countries
In contrast to the prevalent notion that rural-to-urban migration drives urbanization, Ashira Menashe-Oren and Philippe Bocquier find that the role of migration (and reclassification) in urbanization was small between 1985 … Read more
Spain: a pioneer in gender-equal parental leave
Gender equality in child care can be promoted through individual entitlements to a non-transferable and well-paid leave of equal duration for women and men. While this design is still rare … Read more
Han Chinese population shares in Tibet: early insights from the 2020 census of China
The early results of the 2020 Census of the People’s Republic of China shed light on the highly politicised issue of Han Chinese population shares in the Tibetan areas of … Read more
Swiss, elderly, single, and childless. Happy?
Around the world, more and more people age without close kin. Contrary to expectations, however, according to Małgorzata Mikucka, this does not reduce their life satisfaction, or at least not … Read more
Gender and socioeconomic inequalities in health after age 50 in Europe
Does the impact of socioeconomic factors on health after midlife vary among women and men depending on the welfare context? Apparently it does: Damiano Uccheddu, Anne H. Gauthier, Nardi Steverink, … Read more
Towards a better identification of older people at risk of depression
Depression is one of the most common mental disorders in later life. Omar Paccagnella suggests a new approach to classify older individuals into distinct subgroups, based on different combinations of … Read more
Homogamy among high-income partners drives up family income inequality
More married couples today consist of two high-income or two low-income partners (i.e., income homogamy), which leads to greater income inequality in married-couple families. Yifan Shen shows that, all else … Read more
Slower population growth signals successes and benefits
Results from 2020 population censuses for the United States and China made headlines about population collapse, baby busts and demographic decline. Lopsided lamentations have given little attention to the social, … Read more
Spurring economic growth through human development
In the interest of boosting the long-term rate of economic growth in low- and middle-income countries, policymakers are advised to pursue investments in human development that improve reproductive and general … Read more
Growing old in a post-communist society. Who gets lonely in Poland and when?
Małgorzata Mikucka sheds new light on the loneliness of elderly people in Poland, focusing on the events and transitions that trigger this feeling. Weak social ties and a legacy of … Read more
Average length of life spent childless. Cross-sectionally speaking
In addition to the commonly used fertility measures, Ryohei Mogi, Jessica Nisén, and Vladimir Canudas-Romo suggest an alternative approach to the study of first birth behaviour, focusing on how long women … Read more
The transition to late adulthood: past adversities increase frailty
Health deteriorates with age, and it can be further worsened by adversities experienced during early adulthood and middle age. On SHARE data, Francesca Zanasi, Gustavo De Santis and Elena Pirani measure … Read more
Missing boys in sub-Saharan Africa due to high rates of foetal loss
The ratio of males to females at birth is consistently lower in sub-Saharan Africa than in other regions of the world. Anne Morse and Nancy Luke suggest that this pattern may be … Read more
The motherhood earnings penalty reconsidered: a gap or a gradient?
Examining the long-term consequences of the family life course for women’s earnings in 22 European countries, Joanne S. Muller, Nicole Hiekel & Aart C. Liefbroer find no earnings gap between mothers … Read more
It all depends on how you do it. Health effects of leaving the labour market
Relying on data from the longitudinal Survey of Health, Ageing and Retirement in Europe (2004-2015), and adopting a propensity score matching approach, Elena Pirani, Gustavo De Santis and Francesca Zanasi … Read more
International migrants in Sweden, over-coverage, and mortality
The apparent lower mortality of international migrants has sometimes been questioned, because data quality may be a serious issue in this case. However, deeper investigation into the matter by Matthew … Read more
Skip-generation household trends in low- and middle-income countries
Zachary Zimmer and Emily Treleaven find a growing global prevalence of households that have grandparents living with grandchildren with middle generation absent. Country-level factors, like labor force participation rates, explain … Read more
Italians and foreigners: how distant are they, culturally speaking?
Can cultural distance hinder the integration of foreigners? The answer would be easier if we knew what cultural distance is. Gustavo De Santis, Mauro Maltagliati and Alessandra Petrucci try to … Read more
America’s retirement riddle
With U.S. Social Security Trust Funds projected to be insolvent in 2035, America is again facing its retirement riddle. Congress can address the insolvency by making possible adjustments in three … Read more
Longer lives, poorer health in England
Stephen Jivraj, Alissa Goodman, Benedetta Pongiglione and George Ploubidis find that, among working-age adults in England, later-born cohorts tend to have higher prevalence of various indicators of poor health and … Read more
Hypergamy on the decline in Europe
As women’s levels of education increasingly overtake those of men, educational hypergamy (male educational advantage in a relationship) is declining throughout Europe, as Dávid Erát shows. Who chooses whom? The … Read more
The role of non-resident family in migration after separation
Amy Spring, Clara H. Mulder, Michael J. Thomas, Thomas J. Cooke find that the presence of non-resident family plays an important role in separated people’s decisions to migrate within the … Read more
Children of same-sex parents: an educational success story
Challenging claims of disadvantage in same-sex parented families, Jan Kabátek and Francisco Perales find that same-sex-parented children actually outperform their peers in many areas of academic achievement. Over the last … Read more
Pleasure and fidelity: Italian millennials and sex
Sexual intercourse is starting earlier than before among Italian adolescents, whose behaviour is converging towards the norms of their European peers. As noted by Gianpiero Dalla Zuanna and Daniele Vignoli, … Read more
Accelerating fertility decline through education and family planning
Daphne H. Liu and Adrian E. Raftery find that increasing women’s educational attainment and contraceptive prevalence can have an accelerating effect on fertility decline in high-fertility countries, with a larger … Read more
COVID-19 pandemic: demographic highlights
The COVID-19 pandemic caused by the SARS-CoV-2 coronavirus has resulted in enormous consequences worldwide. Joseph Chamie highlights the pandemic’s impact on the components of population change: mortality, fertility and migration. … Read more
Grandparents looking after grandchildren in England
Giorgio Di Gessa, Paola Zaninotto and Karen Glaser find that, in England, most grandmothers and grandfathers provide grandchild care throughout the year to allow parents to undertake paid work. However, … Read more
Are demographic indicators really converging in post transitional countries?
After the demographic transition, convergence in all demographic behaviours (moderate fertility, low mortality and very low migration) is the guiding assumption of the UN World Population Prospects Revisions. Maria Castiglioni, … Read more
Trends in age at menarche in low- and middle-income countries
Understanding the timing and determinants of age at menarche is key to determining potential linkages between onset of puberty and health outcomes from a lifecourse perspective. Tiziana Leone and Laura … Read more
From deprivation to neonatal and post-neonatal mortality in Bolivia
Filippo Temporin identifies three possible mechanisms whereby deprivation can affect neonatal and post-neonatal mortality. Using data from the 2008 Bolivia Demographic and Health Survey, however, he concludes that in a … Read more
Religion as a moderating factor in the education-fertility relationship
Female education is often linked to lower fertility levels and higher rates of childlessness. However, this relationship does not necessarily hold for all population groups. In this study, Nitzan Peri-Rotem … Read more
Internet: a tool for promoting contraceptive uptake in sub-Saharan African countries
The Internet is a time-saving and cost-effective modern technology to enact general healthcare programs. Veronica Toffolutti, Hai Ma, Giulia Menichelli, Ester Berlot, Letizia Mencarini and Arnstein Aassve argue that it … Read more
U.S. immigrant men’s earning trajectories vary by country of origin
Immigrant men who arrived in the United States in the latter part of the twentieth century experienced varied earning trajectories. Leafia Ye and Michal Engelman show that those who came … Read more
Strong combined impact of smoking, obesity, and alcohol on survival improvements in Europe
Smoking, obesity and alcohol are considered key public health problems in Europe. Fanny Janssen, Sergi Trias-Llimós, and Anton Kunst show how changes over time in these three lifestyle factors have … Read more
Health at older ages: childless adults not always worse off than parents
As children are often the main source of support in later life, childless older adults are presumed to have higher risks of poor health compared to parents. Nekehia T. Quashie, … Read more
Women’s employment 1996-2016: US vs Europe
Among OECD countries, the United States was once a leader in women’s labor force participation, but is now a laggard. Jennifer Hook and Eunjeong Paek compare trends in American and … Read more
What becomes of marriage when non-marital childbearing is the norm?
Nowhere in Europe is the share of births out of marriage larger than in Iceland. Nevertheless, most Icelanders marry. In this article Ari Klængur Jónsson argues that even though the … Read more
Female genital mutilation/cutting in Africa: ineffective policies and persistent inequalities
Using nationally representative data from Demographic and Health Surveys and Multiple Indicator Cluster Surveys, Valeria Cetorelli, Ben Wilson, Ewa Batyra and Ernestina Coast examine whether national policies banning female genital mutilation/cutting … Read more
Migrant children’s schooling in urban China
Massive internal migration in China has led to a rise in the population of migrant children. Yuanfei Li, Zai Liang and Zhongshan Yue examine schooling choices for migrant children in … Read more
Grandmotherhood and retirement in Italy
The article explores the relationship between becoming a grandmother and retiring in Italy. In contrast to the US and other countries in Europe, the two events do not overlap in … Read more
Does population aging erode democratic support?
Individual support for democracy in the population is essential for the stability of democracies. However, not much is known about how demographic change, such as population aging, affects attitudes in … Read more
Socioeconomic differences in life satisfaction and longevity in Spain
Aïda Solé-Auró and Mariona Lozano present data on “satisfied life expectancy” by gender and educational level in Spain. One of their somewhat paradoxical findings is that even though Spaniards are … Read more
Prevalence of chronic diseases associated with increased risk of severe COVID-19 in the Philippines
The Philippines has the one of the highest numbers of COVID-19 cases in Southeast Asia. Using the 2016 National Disability Prevalence Survey, Jeofrey B. Abalos describes the prevalence of chronic … Read more
How many people experience homelessness in Australia?
Homelessness is damaging to individuals and society – and an exceedingly difficult phenomenon for researchers and policy makers to measure and analyse. In this article, James O’Donnell describes a new … Read more
Selecting highly educated immigrants may not significantly raise the average education of the U.S. labor force
In the U.S., adopting a Canadian‐style admissions policy, i.e., explicitly selecting immigrants based on educational attainment,would not significantly improve the educational level of the labor force, and the (unlikely) elimination … Read more
The subnational Human Development Index: details on inequality
Studies on the distribution of human development across the globe tend to omit the variations that exist within countries. Iñaki Permanyer and Jeroen Smits fill this gap by developing a … Read more
Education and sexually transmitted infections among Malawian adolescents
Barbara S. Mensch, Monica Grant and Erica Soler-Hampejsek estimate the effect of enrolment, grade attainment, and skills on herpes and HIV among Malawian adolescents. Grade attained is significantly associated with … Read more
More siblings, less wealth in today’s Germany
Philipp M. Lersch studies the relationship between people’s number of siblings and their economic wealth in Germany. He finds that additional siblings reduce wealth by about 38%. Parental wealth moderates … Read more
Accounting for diffusion, broader family planning program effects found in Nigeria
Few investigators examine program diffusion because they lack data from outside the intervention areas. Using data collected from state-level surveys, David Guilkey, Lisa Calhoun and Ilene Speizer demonstrate the spread of … Read more
Comparing mortality variability between the United States and peer countries
Compared to other high-income countries, the United States has lower life expectancy and greater age-specific mortality variability, due in part to a higher concentration of deaths at young ages. Justin M. … Read more
The spatial integration of immigrants in Europe
Working on 1,396 sub-regional areal units, Daniel T. Lichter, Domenico Parisi, and Shrinidhi Ambinakudige show that in almost all European countries, immigrants from outside Europe are less spatially integrated with … Read more
Frontline workers in the U.S.: race, ethnicity, and gender
Lily Casura, Ricardo Lowe, Jr., Cristina Martinez, Sarah Serpas, Victoria Castellanos, and Joachim Singelmann examine the sociodemographic characteristics of frontline workers in the United States in terms of race/ethnicity, sex, … Read more
Does information change attitudes toward immigrants?
Alexis Grigorieff, Christopher Roth and Diego Ubfal estimate the effect of providing information about the size and characteristics of the immigrant group on attitudes toward immigrants in the United States.They … Read more
Is support between parents and adult children reciprocal?
Hans Hämäläinen and Bruno Arpino investigate short-term reciprocity of intergenerational support from the viewpoint of adult children. They consider multiple forms of support and examine whether previously received support from … Read more
Putting mobile phones in women’s hands spurs sustainable development
For billions of people, mobile phones provide a means to communicate effectively, to obtain information, and to access vital services for health, education, society, and the economy. Francesco C. Billari, … Read more
Opposites attract. Unions between majority natives and marriage migrants in Sweden
Marriage with the prospect of migration may lead to new patterns of union formation in globalized marriage markets. Annika Elwert looks at characteristics and marriage patterns of majority natives who … Read more
More children linked to lower mortality in contemporary Norway, with exceptions
In Norway, as the number of children increases, mortality generally falls or remains almost constant. However, Øystein Kravdal notes an exception when it comes to cardiovascular disease mortality: for men who … Read more
The child health benefits of parents’ education in diverse African families
Does union status affect the intergenerational transmission of advantage? Using data from 30 African countries, Emily Smith-Greenaway examines whether the health advantages associated with parents’ education are comparable for childrenwith … Read more
The gender-cliff: Why women tend to earn less than their male partners
Women tend to earn less than their male partners, all over the world. André Grow and Jan Van Bavel show that this can easily be explained by combining the unequal … Read more
Fertility inequality can slow down global poverty reduction in developing countries
Debates about global poverty often omit demographic factors. Frank-Borge Wietzke tries to fill this gap, and documents a significant effect of fertility on poverty. This influence works in large part … Read more
On the (changing) relationship between life expectancy and lifespan inequality
Life expectancy at birth is widely employed to measure longevity. However, as José Manuel Aburto, Ginevra Floridi and Ella Fegitz argue, another complementary dimension of great relevance in health research … Read more
How cash support and tax relief may matter for third births in Hungary
Well targeted policy measures can influence fertility even in times of intensive social and economic change. Analysing data from the Hungarian Generations and Gender Survey, Zsolt Spéder, Lívia Murinkó and … Read more
Migrants’ fertility in Italy: a comparison between origin and destination
It is rarely possible to compare stayers in an origin country, migrants from that country and non-migrants in the destination country.In the case of Italy, however, Roberto Impicciatore, Giuseppe Gabrielli … Read more
Do childhood migration experiences affect migration behaviour in adulthood?
Aude Bernard and Sergi Vidal investigate the impact of childhood moves on internal migration behaviour in adulthood in 11 European countries. They find that childhood moves significantly increase the likelihood … Read more
Gender-asymmetric time allocation and divorce. A US-West Germany comparison
Examining couples in both the United States and western Germany, Daniela Bellani and Gøsta Esping-Andersen find lower divorce risks when the division of unpaid work is more balanced. This suggests … Read more
Two centuries of change in the spatial inequality of mortality in France
Spatial inequalities in mortality decreased in France between 1881 and 1980 (“the century of convergence”), and life expectancy increased at national level. However, Florian Bonnet and Hippolyte d’Albis show that … Read more
Markedly lower child mortality in Malawi and Uganda with more educated mothers
Using data from Demographic and Health Surveys, Liliana Andriano and Christiaan Monden show that, everything else equal, each additional year of maternal schooling reduces children’s probability of dying before age … Read more
Family planning and child health care: the Peruvian case, 1996-2000
In 1996-2000, for the first time in Peru, surgical contraception was promoted among indigenous women, and sometimes imposed upon them. As Marianna Battaglia and Nina Pallarés show, its overall positive … Read more
Transnational families living between Africa and Europe
International migration and family life are frequently difficult to reconcile. Valentina Mazzucato, Djamila Schans, Kim Caarls, and Cris Beauchemin focus on three cases (the Democratic Republic of Congo, Ghana, and … Read more
Why has migrant fertility in Norway declined?
Fertility among immigrants has declined in many Western countries. In Norway, Marianne Tønnessen finds that the successful integration of immigrants is not the main driver of the decline since 2000, … Read more
Same-sex marriages in Sweden: 20 years of change
Martin Kolk and Gunnar Andersson study the evolution of same-sex marriages, childbearing and divorce in Sweden. They highlight increases in childbearing and marriage of female couples in particular, and a … Read more
Strong family ties moderate the negative effect of family size on children’s education, in Wisconsin (USA)
Recent studies have questioned whether family size negatively affects children’s educational outcomes. Based on information from the extended famil, Ea Blaabæk and Joseph Molitoris find that family size has a … Read more
Dual earners’ parental employment strategies in Belgium
Even in Belgium, despite its strong work-family reconciliation policies, childbearing pushes couples towards more traditional gender roles: when one member of a couple exits the labour market or takes parental … Read more
Breaking down the increase in non-marital births in Finland
Low-educated persons are especially likely to have their children outside marriage in Finland. While the proportion of people with low education has declined sharply in most countries in recent decades, … Read more
Migrant mortality advantage and the selection hypothesis
We frequently hear that international migrants are a selected subgroup of their origin populations. The veracity of this statement is generally just assumed or inferred from comparison on some specific … Read more
Legalizing same-sex marriages improves subjective well-being (in England and Wales)
Legalizing same-sex marriage is as an important step toward reducing differences in well-being based on sexual orientation. For example, the subjective well-being of individuals in same-sex couples increased following legalizationin … Read more
Missing twins and twin-singleton mortality convergence in Sub-Saharan Africa
Substantial literature documents that twins have higher mortality than singletons, but does not address whether this twin disadvantage eventually disappears, and if so, at what age. Roland Pongou, David Shapiro … Read more
Do birds of a feather really flock together?
Hill Kulu and Tina Hannemann investigated the spread of ethnic intermarriage and co-ethnic marriage across different ethnic minorities in the UK. They found specific socio-economic factors for different ethnic minorities … Read more
Explaining disability trends in the United States, 1963-2015
Using the world’s longest running survey of health data, the National Health Interview Survey, Jona Schellekens shows that the decrease in mortality from cardiovascular disease in the US postponed the … Read more
Impact of obesity on life expectancy levels and trends in Europe
Since the 1980s, obesity prevalence has increased threefold in many European countries. Without obesity, life expectancy in 26 European countries in 2012 would have been, on average, 1.2 years higher … Read more
Demography and development in the maze of Indian districts
A striking contrast in demographic and development indicators emerges from a recent analysis of the 640 districts of India, which Sanjay K. Mohanty, Udaya S. Mishra, Rajesh K. Chauhan and … Read more
Declines in racial and ethnic disparities in poverty and affluence in the United States, 1959-2015
Racial and ethnic disparities in the relative likelihood of experiencing poverty and affluence in the United States generally narrowed over the 1959 to 2015 period, indicative of moderate steps toward … Read more
Demographic change and aging without family: a global perspective
Some older adults do not have spouses or biological children, i.e. the types of family members who are most likely to provide help in case of need. Rachel Margolis and … Read more
Free childcare could increase African women’s economic empowerment
Offering free daycare services could substantially increase female employment in Africa. Results from a randomized control trial conducted by Shelley Clark, Caroline Kabiru, Sonia Laszlo, and Stella Muthuri in an … Read more
Gender gaps and educational differences in living alone across Europe
In recent decades, the proportion of individuals living alone has increased in many European countries. Glenn Sandström and Lena Karlsson compare the living arrangements of the working-age population, showing that … Read more
The demographic dividend is driven by education, not changes in age structure
Wolfgang Lutz, Jesus Crespo Cuaresma, and Nicholas Gailey show that the “demographic dividend” does not result from the opening of “a window of opportunity” caused by a declining youth dependency … Read more
Son preference and within-household bargaining position of Pakistani women
Rashid Javed and Mazhar Mughal analyze the effects of the pervasive phenomenon of son preference on Pakistani women’s participation in household decision-making. They find that women with at least one … Read more
In Switzerland, fertility does not rhyme with happiness
Parenthood typically improves people’s life satisfaction, even if only in the short run. Surprisingly, instead, Malgorzata Mikucka finds that a second birth has a negative, albeit temporary, effect on Swiss … Read more
Longer birth intervals can reduce infant mortality in poor countries
Recent work on wealthy populations has called into question long-standing conclusions about the importance of birth spacing for infant health. Using data from 77 countries, Joseph Molitoris and colleagues show … Read more
Earning their keep? Fostering, education and work in Tanzania
Fostering is common throughout sub-Saharan Africa, but the motivations for fostering and consequences for fostered children remain unclear. In northern Tanzania, Sophie Hedges, Rebecca Sear, Jim Todd, Mark Urassa, and … Read more
Disparities in mortality and marriage create unequal kin safety nets in the USA
Heeju Sohn quantifies the diverging kin networks of adults with low and high socioeconomic status (SES) in the United States. In 2013, high SES adults had about 13 years with … Read more