Families Are Changing
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Doing Better for Families © OECD 2011 Chapter 1 Families are changing Families have changed over the past thirty years. This chapter provides an overview of the changes in family formation, household structure, work-life balance, and child well-being. Fertility rates have been persistently low in many OECD countries leading to smaller families. With marriage rates down and divorce rates up, there are an increasing number of children growing up in sole-parent or reconstituted families. Sole-parent families are of particular concern due to the high incidence of poverty among such households. Poverty risks are highest in jobless families and lowest amongst dual-earner families. Important gains in female educational attainment and investment in more family-friendly policies have contributed to a rise in female and maternal employment, but long-standing differences in gender outcomes in the labour market still persist. The increased labour market participation of mothers has had only a limited effect on the relative child poverty rate as households without children have made even larger income gains. Child well-being indicators have moved in different directions: average family incomes have risen but child poverty rates are also up. More youngsters are now in employment or education than before, while evidence on health outcomes is mixed. Overall, are families doing better? Some undoubtedly are, but many others face serious constraints when trying to reconcile work and family aspirations. 17 1. FAMILIES ARE CHANGING Introduction Families are changing in many ways across the OECD and its enhanced-engagement partners. Most countries have seen a decline in the fertility rate over the past three decades. Today almost no OECD country has a total fertility rate above the population replacement rate of two children per women. As a result the average household size has also declined over this period. At the same time, there has been a sharp increase in the proportion of women entering the labour force. The evidence on trends in child well-being is mixed, and important challenges remain. There are still large gender gaps in employment and earnings and one in eight children, on average across the OECD, still lives in relative poverty. Family formation patterns are also changing. Increasingly, both men and women want to first establish themselves in the labour market before founding a family. Hence, the age of mothers at first childbirth has risen and with it the probability of having fewer children than previous generations. Many women remain childless. Birth rates have fallen and life expectancy has increased, so there are fewer children and more grandparents than before. Figure 1.1, Panel A and Panel B illustrates how birth rates and average household sizes have fallen in most OECD countries since the 1980s.1 Female educational attainment and female employment participation (Figure 1.1, Panel C) have both risen over the last 30 years. Women have a better chance of fulfilling their labour market aspirations and much needed additional labour supply has been mobilised. And while increased maternal employment has contributed to material wealth among families with children, comparable societal groups without children have also seen similar gains. Poverty rates among households with children, based on a relative poverty concept related to half of equivalised median household income, have increased slightly across the OECD over the past 10 years (Figure 1.1, Panel D). Issues in family policy, underlying policy objectives and evidence on good practices will be discussed in subsequent chapters. This chapter outlines some of the key indicators that illustrate modern family life and how these affect the well-being of children and parents across the OECD countries and its enhanced engagement partners.2 The second section provides an overview of the change in family formation over the past thirty years, while the following section illustrates changes in household structure and changes in parent-parent and parent-child relationships. The next section focuses on employment outcomes for parents and what effect this may have on family poverty risks. Before summarising the overall family outcomes, the final section considers child well-being against three key dimensions of material, education and health outcomes. Trends in fertility and family formation In many OECD countries, policy makers are increasingly concerned about adults being able to have as many children as they desire. Fertility behaviour can be constrained for different reasons: the perceived inability to match work and care commitments because of 18 DOING BETTER FOR FAMILIES © OECD 2011 1. FAMILIES ARE CHANGING Figure 1.1. Families are changing Panel A. Total fertility rates, 1980 and 20091 Panel B. Average household size,2 mid-1980s and mid-2000s3 2009 1980 Mid-2000s Mid-1980s Israel 2.96 Turkey 4.11 Iceland 2.22 Mexico 4.03 New Zealand 2.14 Chile 3.72 Turkey 2.12 Korea 2.97 Mexico 2.08 Ireland 2.07 Slovak Republic 2.90 United States 2.01 Ireland 2.85 Chile 2.00 Poland 2.84 France 1.99 Spain 2.83 Norway 1.98 Portugal 2.79 United Kingdom 1.94 Greece 2.73 Sweden 1.94 Japan 2.71 Australia 1.90 Finland 1.86 New Zealand 2.65 Denmark 1.84 Replacement rate = 2.1 OECD31 average 2.63 Belgium 1.83 Italy 2.58 Netherlands 1.79 United States 2.57 OECD34 average 1.74 Iceland 2.57 Canada 1.66 Australia 2.53 Estonia 1.63 Hungary 2.53 Luxembourg 1.59 2.52 Slovenia 1.53 Czech Republic Greece 1.53 Luxembourg 2.50 Switzerland 1.50 Canada 2.47 Czech Republic 1.49 France 2.38 Slovak Republic 1.41 Austria 2.34 Italy 1.41 Belgium 2.32 Spain 1.40 Netherlands 2.28 Poland 1.40 2.24 Austria 1.39 Switzerland Japan 1.37 Norway 2.14 Germany 1.36 Finland 2.14 Hungary 1.33 Denmark 2.13 Portugal 1.32 United Kingdom 2.12 Korea 1.15 Germany 2.09 India 2.74 Sweden 1.99 South Africa 2.43 Indonesia 2.17 India 4.80 Brazil 1.86 South Africa 3.90 China 1.77 Brazil 3.69 Russian Federation 1.54 Russian Federation 2.80 0 1.0 2.0 3.0 4.0 5.0 0 1.0 2.0 3.0 4.0 5.0 Children per woman Number of persons in household Panel D. Proportion of children in poor households,4 Panel C. Proportion of women (aged 15-64) in the labour market, 1995 and 2009 mid-1990s and mid- to late-2000s5 2009 1995 Mid/late-2000s Mid-1990s Iceland 77.2 Israel 26.6 Norway 74.4 Mexico 25.8 Switzerland 73.8 Turkey 24.6 Denmark 73.1 United States 21.6 Netherlands 70.6 Sweden 70.2 Poland 21.5 Canada 69.1 Chile 20.5 Finland 67.9 Spain 17.3 New Zealand 67.4 Portugal 16.6 Austria 66.4 Ireland 16.3 Australia 66.2 Italy 15.3 United Kingdom 65.6 Canada 14.8 65.2 Germany Japan 14.2 Slovenia 63.8 United States 63.4 Greece 13.2 Estonia 63.0 OECD34 average 12.7 Portugal 61.6 Luxembourg 12.4 France 60.0 Estonia 12.4 Japan 59.8 New Zealand 12.2 OECD34 average 59.6 Australia 11.8 57.8 Ireland Slovak Republic 10.9 Luxembourg 57.0 Czech Republic 56.7 Czech Republic 10.3 Belgium 56.0 Korea 10.3 Israel 55.6 United Kingdom 10.1 Spain 53.5 Belgium 10.0 Slovak Republic 52.8 Netherlands 9.6 Poland 52.8 Switzerland 9.4 52.2 Korea Germany 8.3 Hungary 49.9 Greece 48.9 Iceland 8.3 Italy 46.4 France 8.0 Mexico 43.0 Slovenia 7.8 Chile 42.2 Hungary 7.2 Turkey 24.2 Sweden 7.0 China 69.3 Austria 6.2 Russian Federation 64.9 Norway 5.5 Brazil 56.8 Finland Indonesia 49.4 4.2 South Africa 47.1 Denmark 3.7 India 34.2 Russian Federation 20.1 020406080 051015202530 % of female population % children aged < 18 Note: Panel B: Data missing for Estonia, Israel and Slovenia. 1. Data refers to 2007 for Canada; 2008 for Brazil, Chile, China, India and Indonesia. 2. The size of households is determined by members who live in the same dwelling and include dependent children of all ages. 3. Data refers to 2003 for Brazil; 2007 for India and South Africa. 4. Poverty thresholds are set at 50% of the equivalised median household income of the entire population. 5. Data refers to 2008 for Germany, Israel, Italy, Korea, Mexico, Netherlands, New Zealand, Norway, Sweden and the United States; 2007 for Canada, Denmark and Hungary; 2006 for Chile, Estonia, Japan and Slovenia; 2005 for France, Ireland, Switzerland and the United Kingdom; 2004 for Australia, Austria, Belgium, Czech Republic, Finland, Greece, Iceland, Luxembourg, Poland, Portugal, the Slovak Republic, Spain and Turkey. Source: OECD (2010b), OECD Employment Outlook; Provisional data from OECD (2010e), Income Distribution Questionnaires; United Nations Statistical Division, 2010; UNECE, 2010; and national statistical offices, 2010. 1 2 http://dx.doi.org/10.1787/888932392457 DOING BETTER FOR FAMILIES © OECD 2011 19 1. FAMILIES ARE CHANGING inflexible labour markets and/or the lack of public supports, the financial costs of raising children, and the difficulty for prospective parents in finding affordable housing to establish a family of their own. This section illustrates the main drivers of trends in family formation and how they vary between OECD countries. The restrictions to family formation and related public policy issues are discussed in Chapter 3. Fertility patterns Demographic trends involve low and/or declining fertility rates and increasing life expectancy in most OECD countries (OECD, 2010a, CO1.2).