Families and households - Demography

Question 1

Define birth rate and show how it has changed over time.

Answer 1

Birth rate: the number of live births per 1,000 per year
Current birth rate is 1/3 of the 90’s at 11

Question 2

Define the TFR and show how it has changed over time.

Answer 2

The Total Fertility Rate: the average number of children women will have during their fertile years (15-44)
1964: 3
2024: 1.4

Question 3

What are the four reasons for the decline in the birth rate?

Answer 3

• Changes in women’s position
• Decline in infant mortality rate
• Children are now an economic liability
• Child centredness

Question 4

How does change in women’s position affect birth rate? Give a counter argument.

Answer 4

Harper (2012): the increased education of women (GIST/WISE) is the most important reason for the long-term fall in birth rates - educated women are more likely to use family planning and see possibilities aside from mother and wife.

• Reay (1998): W/C girls persist in seeing well-paying masculine jobs as ‘not for us’ so its a generalisation.

Question 5

How does change in IMR affect birth rate? Give a counterargument.

Answer 5

Harper (2012) argues that families will have lots of children if they are more likely to die so a decreasing IMR will decrease birth rate, and vice-versa.

• Brass Kabir (1978): the trend to smaller families did not start in urban areas, where the IMR first fell, but in rural areas

Question 6

How has the IMR changed? Give 2 reasons.

Answer 6

Infant mortality rate is 2% of what it was in 1900, at 4/1000

• Improved housing and sanitation reduces infectious diseases that are more likely to harm babies
• Improved welfare services to make sure babies and families are properly taken care of

Question 7

How have economics affected the birth rate? Give a counterargument.

Answer 7

Pre-the Children and Young Persons Act 1933, children were an economic asset to their family in the short-term, providing a livable wage. Since, they have lost that benefit and have become an economic liability which discourages childbearing.

• IfFS (2024): higher earning women are less likely to have children, which would disagree with the idea that the cost of raising children is the main issue.

Question 8

How has child centredness decreased the birth rate?

Answer 8

Aries (1960): As childhood is considered more important, there is a shift from quantity to quality to ensure children are adequately socialised and happy

Question 9

How do changes in fertility affect the family?

Answer 9

Women may be able to go to work due to having less children and create more equal, dual-earning families. However, fertility is not the only factor, better-off couples may be able to have larger familes and hire childcare to supplement.

Question 10

What is the dependency ratio?

Answer 10

The relationship between the size of the productive and dependant parts of the population, with the earnings of the former needing to support the latter.

Question 11

How do changes in the TFR affect the dependency ratio

Answer 11

In the short-term, children are dependant so a decrease would appear to lighten the ‘burden of dependance’. However, in the long-term, fewer babies means fewer young adults and a smaller working population, increasing the burden.

Question 12

What are the 2 possible effect of changes in fertility?

Answer 12

• Psychological: Fewer children may mean less siblings so childhood may become a lonelier experience, negatively affecting children - Childline calls about lonlieness have risen by 75% in 5 years
• Political focus shifts to catering towards the elderly as they become an even larger portion of the voting population, further alienating the young

Question 13

What is the death rate and how has it changed?

Answer 13

The number of deaths per 1,000 of the population per year
Death rate is less than half of that in 1900, at 9/1000

Question 14

What is the main biological factor in the decreasing death rate?

Answer 14

Tranter (1966): over 3/4 of the decline since 1850 is due to cures and vaccines for infectious diseases like ditheria and tuberculosis (mainly affecting the young) and their replacement with ‘diseases of affluence’ like heart disease.

Question 15

What are the 4 main social reasons for the decreasing death rate?

Answer 15

• Improved nutrition
• Medical improvements
• Smoking and diet
• Public Health measures

Question 16

How does improved nutrition affect the death rate?

Answer 16

McKeown (1972): improved nutrition accounts for up to half of the reduction, particularly in increasing resistance to and survival chances of infectious diseases (specifically TB).

• McKeown fails to explain why females live longer despite receiving a smaller share of food supply. Additionally, he fails to explain why deaths from other infectious diseases like measles rose during times of improved nutrition.

Question 17

How may medical improvements have led to the decline in the death rate?

Answer 17

Improved medical knowledge has allowed for both preventative measures, like SmokeFreeUK, and improvement in treatment, such as antibiotics and blood transfusion.

Question 18

How has changes in smoking affected the death rate?

Answer 18

Harper (2012) argues that the fall in death rate is largely due to the fact that roughly 1/7 the number of people smoke now, leading to less afflictions like asthma or cancer. However, this has been replaced by obesity (1/4 of UK adults), but he argues that we now have an ‘American health culture’, where unhealthy lifestyles can be supported by costly medication.

Question 19

How may public health measures have led to the decline in the death rate?

Answer 19

More hands-on local and central government in the 20th century has led to improvements in the safety of housing, cleaner drinking water, pasteurisation of milk, etc. The Clean Air Act reduced air pollution, which had killed 4,000 people in 5 days in 1952.

Question 20

How has average life expectancy changed for both genders?

Answer 20

Life expectancy of men and women is 1.8x and 1.6x longer than it was in 1900, though women still live, on average, 3 years longer than men.

Question 21

Harper and growing life expectancy:

Answer 21

Harper argues that if life expectancy continues to grow, we will soon achieve ‘radical longevity’ with the number of centenarians 100x what it is now, in 2100.

Question 22

What are the CAGE differences in life expectancy?

Answer 22

• Women still live 3 years longer than men, though this has shrunk from 7 years in 1900
• W/c men in unskilled jobs are 3x more likely to die before 65 than men in professional jobs
• Walker (2011): those living in the poorest parts of England die 7 years earlier, whilst disabled people die 17 years earlier

Question 23

Give evidence of an ageing population.

Answer 23

• The number aged 65 or over equalled the number of under-15s for the first time ever in 2014.

Question 24

What three factors lead to an ageing population?

Answer 24

• Increasing life expectancy
• Declining infant mortality rate
• Declining fertility rates

Question 25

How may an ageing population affect use of public services? Give a criticism.

Answer 25

Older people require a larger amount of care, this leads to higher amounts of 'bed-blocking' and occupation of public services - in some parts of the country 1/3 of beds are occupied by the old and 40% of the NHS budget is spent on over-65s. - M/c people live longer (~7 years) and have the capability to go private so may be more likely to (IHPN (2023): middle- and upper-class people up to 2 more likely to have gone private)

Question 26

How does an ageing population affect housing?

Answer 26

One-person pensioner households account for 1/8 households, drastically decreasing the amount of housing on the market. This becomes an impossible problem as the elderly make up an ever-larger active voting base so it is electorally unadvised to make policy like May's 'Dementia Tax'.

Question 27

What is the effect of an ageing population on the dependecy ratio? Give a counterargument.

Answer 27

More old people decreases the ration between the old and those who work and take care of them, causing an economic strain - the ratio is predicted to fall by 0.4 people for every pensioner by 2033. - This is offset by declining birth rates - The old aren't necessarily economically dependent, the ONS (2016) found that 75 year olds have 50% and 450% more net family wealth than 45 and 35 year olds

Question 28

How is ageism a feature of modernity?

Answer 28

Modernists argue that our identity and status are based on our role within production, which they lack as the retired - this gives them a dependent status and a stigmatised identity.

Question 29

Phillipson (1982) and ageism:

Answer 29

From a marxist perspective, ageism is a product of capitalism disregarding the elderly as incapable of contributing to production, leaving them in the hands of (often female) relatives.

Question 30

What is the postmodern view on age?

Answer 30

In a postmodern world, the fixed, orderly stages of life have fallen apart due to things like people getting married older, this provides people with greater choice.

Question 31

What is the postmodern view on the 'silver economy'?

Answer 31

Postmodernity changes the key to our identity from production to consumption, this creates a market of 'body maintenance' for the old to create their own identities and breaking down stereotypes of the elderly and decreasing ageism.

Question 32

Hunt (2005) and the old:

Answer 32

Postmodernity now means we can choose a lifestyle and identity regardless of age: our age no longer determines who we are or how we live. Ageism is also undermined by two other processes: the centrality of media now displays positive aspects of elderly lifestyles; the emphasis of surface features allows the elderly, through anti-ageing products, to write their own identities.

Question 33

Give two criticisms of the postmodern perspective on ageism.

Answer 33

Pilcher (1995) argues that postmodernists fail to account for inequalities: - Poorer elderly have a lower life expectancy and often suffer infirmity and poverty, affecting 'identity writing' - Women have lower pensions due to career breaks and lower wages, they are also subject to sexist ageism, with use of phrases like 'hag'

Question 34

Age concern (2004) and ageism:

Answer 34

More people (29%) reported suffering age discrimination than any other form

Question 35

Hirsch (2005) and policy:

Answer 35

An ageing population will need to be addressed by multiple policies: - They can be financed by paying more from our savings and taxes while we are working, or by working for longer, or both. - housing policy may need to encourage elderly to 'trade down' to free up housing

Question 36

When was net migration at its peak?

Answer 36

Year ending June 2023: 906,000

Question 37

How does immigration affect the age structure?

Answer 37

- Directly: immigrants are generally younger - the average age of a British passport holder is 41, for non- it is 31 - Indirectly: they produce more children - TFR of UK born women at 1.9 in 2011 and non-UK born women at 2.2.

Question 38

How do immigrants affect the dependency ratio:

Answer 38

- They may decrease it because they are younger and working; additionally many older immigrants return to their country of origin to retire (7%) - They may also increase it because they have more children - however, the longer a group stays in the UK, the closer their fertility rate comes to the average

Question 39

What are the three effects of globalisation on migration?

Answer 39

- Acceleration - Differentiation - Feminisation

Question 40

How has migration been 'accelerated'?

Answer 40

Migration is happening at an unprecedented speed: in 2023, 1.2 million people immigrated to the UK, this was around 54,000 in the early 90's. Around 300 million people immigrated globally in 2024.

Question 41

In 2013, how many UK-born and China-born postgraduate students were there?

Answer 41

UK: 23% China: 26%

Question 42

Vertovec (2007) and 'super-diversity':

Answer 42

Globalisation has led to an increase in the types of migrants: legality, orgin, cultures. He calls this 'super-diversity'. Pre-globalisation, the types and orgins of migrants was quite narrow: legal economic migrants from commonwealth countries. Globalisation increased the proportion of migrants coming to the UK for non-economic reasons, like education or rights, and from where, such as EU member nations.

Question 43

Cohen (2006) and the three types of immigrant:

Answer 43

- Citizens: those with full citizenship rights, more difficult since the 1970's - Denizens: priveliged foreign nationals welcomed by the state - Helots: those that are deeply exploited in their migration, those legally tied to employers, the trafficked, illegal immigrants.

Question 44

What is the globalisation of the gender division of labour?

Answer 44

Female migrants are increasingly fitted into patriarchal stereotypes about the role of women in care and sexual gratification.

Question 45

Ehrenreich and Hochschild (2003) and the delegation of labour to female migrants:

Answer 45

Care, domestic, and sex work is increasingly being done by women from poorer countries, as a result of several trends: - Expansion of the service industry calls for more female labour - Western women are now less illing to perform domestic labour, having worked - Western men remain unwilling - State fails to provide adequate childcare

Question 46

Shutes (2011) and adult care nurses:

Answer 46

40% of adult care nurses are migrants, most being women.

Question 47

Eade (1994) and hybrid identities:

Answer 47

Second generation immigrants rank aspects of their identity: Muslim first, the Bengali, then British. These people often face opposition from members of these groups as 'not one of us'.

Question 48

Eriksen (2007) and transnational identities:

Answer 48

Globalisation has led to less people permenantly settling, moving around and forging identities that don't belong to specific cultures, sustaining global ties through technology or seeing themselves as more connected to other migrants than their home country.

Question 49

Outline the first state policy approach to immigration.

Answer 49

Assimilation was the attempt to make immigrants 'like us' by adopting our language and values - it was widely panned as many imigrants wish to maintain their culture as a source of identity.

Question 50

Outline the second state policy approcah to immigration as well as the 2 types.

Answer 50

Multiculturalism understands that immigrants may wish to maintain their own culture and shift British society around it. - Erikson (2007): argued that, although the state is fine with superficial change (shallow diversity), like making the national dish chicken tikka, it's hesitant to make bigger changes (deep diversity), like accepting veiled women.

Question 51

Castles (2000) and assimilationist policies:

Answer 51

Assimilationist policies are counterproductive: by making them 'like us', you other immigrants and often embolden their cultural differences. The state often responds with 'enemy within' policy that further subjugate minorities, defeating the whole point of the policy.

Question 52

Castles and Kosack (1973) and dividing the W/C:

Answer 52

Assimilationist policies encourage the W/C to see immigrants as responsible for social problems like uneployment, maintaining capitalism by implying that the system is not inherently destructive, rather its' *their* fault.